New Generation reads The Lightning Theif
by sciencelover
Summary: 160 years after Percy and Annabeth turned 25, the new generation of Camp Half-Blood will read the PJO books with Thalia!How will Thalia hold up, or how will the new campers take learning she used to be, a tree? This should be intersting.
1. A Sad Anniversary

Chapter 1

**Narrator**

Chiron rubbed his temples with grief. He still couldn't believe it has been that long already. 160 years since Percy and Annabeth died, 155 since Grover died and turned into a poppy flower, 147 since Nico passed away, and 146 since Juniper passed away. Percy and Annabeth would have 185, Nico would be 181, Grover would be about Percy and Annabeth age in human years and Juniper would also be their age.

"They all lived a wonderful live," Chiron told Mr.D while playing pinochle. They been talking about their lives for the past hour, honoring their lives.

"Yea," Mr.D said looking slightly sad," Poseidon and Athena were crying for hours. It took Artemis and Hestia a long time to calm them down."

"I almost cried for an hour," he said," They all were wonderful campers, satyr, and dryads." Mr.D nodded in agreement and started to count his points.

"Drat! You win again Chiron." Chiron nodded and shuffled the cards for another round when there was a bright light. It came quickly and stopped as quickly as it came. On the table was a box. Chiron took our his pocket knife and cut open the top. Inside the box contained books and a note. He picked the note up and read it aloud.

"_'Dear Chiron and Mr.D. I know you are upset about the recent anniversary on some of your camps top campers. Don't you find it strange that they all passed on the same day but different years apart? Anyways, here are the books containing their adventures. I know at one point it will mention the other campers later. Aka Jason, Piper, Leo, and the Romans. Have your top campers read them. P.S. Artemis said Thalia has been grieving for hours. She is sending her to camp to read the books with the other campers. Don't tell the campers that she knew them. They will have to put two and two together. The greatest god ever- Apollo._'"

"While Thalia is coming back," Mr.D said.

"Yea but she most be so upset right now. Her best friends are gone and so is her brother. Now she is going to read about their adventures. How will she react?" Chiron asked.

"I will be upset but I will hide my pain and remember all the good times we had," a voice said behind them. They looked and saw Thalia standing there with her Death to Barbie tee shirt.

"Hello Thalia. How are you doing?"

"Fine," Thalia said," Now where are the campers I am going to read with?"

"I will gather them and you guys can read in the around the campfire," Chiron said. Thalia nodded.

"Ray!" Mr. D yelled to a boy with short, wavy black hair and green eyes who happened to be walking by the big house. He also happened to be one of the campers that will be reading the books with his very close friends, one of them being his little brother. There were eight of them who were either fifteen, sixteen, or seventeen. He happened to be seventeen.

"Yes?" he asked.

"Go gather your group of friends and tell them to go to the campfire area, you included. You are the only people that should be in there and if there is anybody in there, kick them out. Stay there till Chiron comes and tells you why your there," Mr.D said. Ray nodded and ran toward the cabins.

"We will give him a few minutes and go down there. Also when I introduce you, your name will be Sami Grace. I needed to change your first name in case they mention your real name in any of the books. I want them to figure out who you are first. I just decided your last name will be the same," Chiron said to Thalia and she nodded. She couldn't wait to read the stories of her friends past adventures even though she was sad at the same time since they weren't here anymore.

**Talia**

I was sitting on my bunk, playing my guitar with my lucky pick, when I heard a knock at the door. Even though I was the counselor for the Apollo cabin, and I am only fifteen, I didn't want to open the door. I was busy playing my guitar so I was going to let one of my siblings answer it then I released I was the only one in the cabin. I set my guitar down and jumped from my top bunk to the floor. I opened the door to reveal Ray Williams. He is one of my good friends even though he is two years older than me.

"Hey Ray," I said.

"We are needed at the campfire area. Only us and our little group," Ray said.

"Do you know why?"

"Nothing really. Only that we have to wait for Chiron to come and tell us."

"Oh. Do you want me to help you get the others?" I asked.

"No you're the last one." he said," Come on."

I nodded, shut the door, and followed him to the campfire. When we arrived, everyone was already there. I took a set next to my boyfriend Cayden. Cayden Davis is sixteen and has green eyes and short, straight brown hair. He sat next to Nathan Hale, who is also sixteen, has dark blue eyes and short, straight blond hair with a single blue streak. We are the only ones in our group of friends that has part of their hair highlighted. I have bright green highlights in my medium length, wavy, semi-straight black hair. He sat next to Dylan, Ray's little brother, who is fifteen and has brown eyes and wavy black hair that goes to his chin. You can tell their brothers even though they have different eye colors and hair length. Dylan sat next to Jaycee Jean, who is also fifteen and has orange eyes and very curly, shoulder length red hair. Next to her was Shale Anderson but he likes to be called Shay. He is sixteen, has blue-green eyes and short, curly red hair. He sat next to Ella Jamison. She is seventeen and has hazel eyes, really straight shoulder length brown almost black hair. Ray sat next to her since she is his girlfriend.

"Okay Ray," Cayden said," tell us why we are here."

"I already told you. I don't know," Ray said," Mr. D just told me to get you guys and wait for Chiron."

"Then we will just wait for him," Jaycee said. We nodded and after a few minutes, Chiron walked in with a fifteen year old girl. She had spiky black hair and blue eyes and most really dislike Barbie's from her tee shirt she was wearing.

"Hey Chiron," I said," Who's that?" Ray told us while we were waiting for Chiron that we will be the only ones here.

"This is Sami and she will be joining you in reading some books," Chiron said.

"Wait reading?" Shay asked and Chiron nodded. "Why are we reading and why is she here?"

"For your first question yes you will be reading to learn about the past. And why Sami," Chiron said saying her name quite loud," is here is because she will be reading with you. Why? You will have to figure that out as you read." Sami sat on the ground and looked kinda of sad for a moment. It only lasted for a second till Chiron looked at her and she turned happy. "Maybe I should introduce you fully," Chiron said," This is Sami Grace. Her parent will remain a secret till you figure out why she is reading with you. Sami meet Talia Rick, daughter of Apollo," he said pointing at me. I swear I seen her say to herself "Red eyes? I never seen a child of Apollo have red." I shook my head. I probably heard her wrong. "Cayden Davis, son of Ares, Nathan Hale son of Aphrodite," he looked at Thalia and mouthed is like Piper. Who the heck is Piper? "Dylan Williams, son of Hermes, Jaycee Jean, daughter of Iris, Shale Anderson, call him Shay, is the son of Hecate, Ella Jamison, daughter of Demeter, and Ray Williams, son of Hermes. Any questions?"

"What are we reading?" Ella asked.

"A book Apollo delivered. It is about one of the campers and his friends. It takes place a while ago," Chiron said looking grim as he said that and so did Sami but they regained their composure," It is about time to you learn the history of one of our most important campers. You can read in any order you want but you all have to read one chapter each." We nodded and he handed a book to me and left. Sami sat there looking kinda sad.

"Sami you can sit next to me if you want," I said. She nodded and sat next to me.

"Talia you can start first, then Sami, than Cayden, and then will go down the line," Nathan said. I nodded.

"Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief," I read aloud.

* * *

><p><strong>Revised as of 3-27-12. <strong>


	2. Vaporize My PreAlgebra Teacher

**All I have to say is WHOA! Ever since I posted the first chapter, my email account has been getting tons of emails saying blah blah reviewed, listed this story on their favorite story list, subscribed to an story or an auther alert. You guys made me so happy. Anyways for the people that review said the right answer for who Nathan Hale was in real life so good job. If you didn't know here is who he is (I'm going add a little more than what most people said): Nathan Hale was a spy for the Continatal Army durning the Revolutionary War. The British ended up finding out he was spying on them and giving their secrets away. Before he was excuted, he said "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country." So without further ado, I present you chapter 2!**

**Disclaimer- I only own the OCs I made**

* * *

><p>Chapter 2<p>

Talia

"**Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief**," I read aloud.

"Is that the chapter name or something?" Shay asked.

"No its the title. Percy Jackson is the main camper in this story," Sami said.

"How do you know?" Ray asked.

"I could tell from the title," Sami said making him looked dumb which is pretty easy to do.

"**I Accidentally Vaporize My Pre-Algebra Teacher**," I read," Now that's the chapter title Shay." He stuck his tongue out at me. Good comeback Shay.

**Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood. If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: close this book right now.**

"Great advice. We are already half-bloods and we can't change it," Dylan said," Is he dumb or something?"

"Just listen to the story," Sami said.

**Believe what ever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life. Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.**

"Already knew that," Ray said earning a slap to the back of the head from Ella.

"Don't be a smart alec," she said.

**If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened. But if you recognize yourself in these pages-**

'Don't worry we will,' I thought.

**stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before_ they_ sense it too, and they'll come for you. Don't say I didn't warn you. **

**My name is Percy Jackson.**

"Called it," Sami said.

"Yea you did," Dylan said.

**I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.**

"So he lives in New York," Nathan said causing Sami to nod sadly. Why does she look so sad hearing/reading this story? I mean, she didn't personally know the guy. This took place a long time ago. **(A/N: Irony alert!)**

**Am I a troubled kid? Yeah. You could say that. I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan- twenty-eight mental case kids and few teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.**

"Sounds like torture," Cayden said causing me to roll my eyes.

**I know- sounds like torture. Most Yancy field trips were.**

"See! Even Percy agrees with me!" he yelled.

"That's just creepy," Ella said.

"Agreed," Sami said.

**But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip so I had hopes. Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy bread and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee.**

"Sounds like Chiron," Shay said.

"Probably is," Jaycee said.

**You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.**

"Surprise, surprise," Sami whispered to herself," You always fell asleep in class."

**I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble. Boy, was I wrong.**

"Of course you were," Sami said.

**See bad things happen to me on field trips.**

"And probably in real life too," I said.

**Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I has this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway. And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool. I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took and unplanned swim. And the time before that...Well, you get the idea. This trip, I was determined to be good.**

Both Ray and Nathan snorted at that and Sami smiled and shook her head in disbelief. I smiled as soon as Sami did. It was good to see her smile and be happy and not sad. Luckily she stayed like that for a while and didn't became sad right away.

**All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomanic girl, hitting my best friend Grover **

'If I knew that,' Sami thought,' I would have killed her as soon as I became a teenage girl again. Nobody hurts my best friend who brought me to camp.'

**in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich. Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated.**

"Thats not nice to say about your best friend," Ella said.

"He probably doesn't know that," Dylan said.

**He must've been held back several grades because he was the only six grader with ance and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.**

Some of laughed our head off at that. Mean I know. Why? Um we are just freaks like that. Sami's smile grew even bigger at that.

**Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension-**

"I hate in-school suspension. I had it like six times already," Dylan said.

"The last one could have been avoided if you didn't hack the principal's computer to expande all our breaks and add way more field trips," I said.

"I could have seen you getting a bigger punishment," Ray grumbled.

**if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.**

**"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.**

**Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter." He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.**

**"That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.**

"Oh come Grover! At least let him punch her!" Cayden yelled. I was about to yell at him but I really wanted Percy to punch the lights out of that girl.

**"You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens." Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there. In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.**

"He should of," Ella said. I gasped. She rarly agreed to violence. "What?"

"You never agree to violence," I said.

"People can change."

**Mr. Brunner led the museum tour. He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery. It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.**

Sami started laughing her head off at that causing us to. We were like that for a while.

**He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone colunm with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a _stele_, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he has to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.**

Sami froze at that. I wonder why?

**Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into you locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.**

Hearing that, Sami paled.

"Sami are you okay?" I asked. Hearing my voice, she seemed to be brought backed into the real world.

"Yea," she said," I'm fine. Continue please."

**From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spwan. She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.**

"She sounds creppy," Ray said.

"She probably is," Jaycee said.

**One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight,-**

"Harsh," Shay said.

"Not like they time Chiron made us clean the stables for a month," Dlyan said.

"Agreed."

**I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said,"You're absolutely right."**

"Creppy. Again," Ray said.

**Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art. Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said," Will you _shut up_?"**

All the guys cheered for Percy while all us girls smiled.

**It came out louder than I meant it to.**

**The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.**

**"Mr. Jackson," he said," did you have a comment?"**

"Busted," Nathan said.

**My face was totally red. I said,"No, sir."**

**Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"**

**I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it.**

"What a surprised," Sami said.

**"That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"**

**"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied.**

"Sounds like Chiron," Dylan said.

"Probably is," I said.

**"And he did this because..."**

**"Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and-"**

"Titan, not god," Ella said.

**"God?" Mr. Brunner asked.**

**"Titan," I corrected myself. "And... he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife his baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sister-"**

**"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.**

"Thats how I felt when I first heard that story," Shay said.

"Baby," I said.

**"-and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued,"and the gods won."**

**Some snickers from the group.**

"Idiots," Jaycee said.

"Hopefully they don't think he is a nerd," I said.

"I hope so too," Sami said.

**Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend," Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications,'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"**

"We need it for real life,"Sami said," So you should shut your big fat mouth!"

"You know your talking to a book right?" Ray said.

"But it actually happened," she said.

**"And why, Mr. Jackson," Mr. Brunner said,"to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"**

**"Busted," Grover muttered.**

**"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.**

**At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.**

"Definitely Chiron," Dylan said.

"Sometimes I hate how good his hearing is," Ray said," He caught Sammy and I talking about burning down a cabin for kicks."

"And you did it anyways even after he told you not to," Ella said.

**I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."**

**"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartartus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"**

"I could never eat lunch after hearing that," Nathan said.

"None of us could," Sami said.

**The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like dofuses.**

**Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson." I knew that was coming.**

"Me to," I said.

"Of course you did," Cayden grumbled.

"Shut up," I said. He knew not to say anything back or do anything cause I have older friends, not part of our group of course, and older siblings that will hurt him if he hurts me (I was here longer than them so thats why I am my cabins counselor). But he is just to nice to do that anyways.

**I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"**

**Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go-**

"Don't worry," Shay said," I got that look a lot when I messed up a spell."

"Good thing you don't mess up spells anymore," Nathan grumbled," I hated that time when you turned me into a raven."

"It was pretty funny," Jaycee said.

"It was not," he grumbled. I continued before a fight could break out.

**intense brown eyes that could been a thousand years old and had seen everything.**

We all started cracking up at that.

"Very observant," I said.

**"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.**

**"About the Titans?"**

**"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."**

**"Oh."**

**"What you learn from me," he said," is vitally important.**

"When is it not?" Dylan said.

**I expect you to treat it a such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."**

**I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.**

'On shit,' Sami thought,' Bad things happen when he is angry. Don't repeat of the Capture the Flag incident Percy.'

**I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshiped.**

"Sounds hard," Shay said.

"Not really," I mumbled.

**But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention defect disorder and I had never made above a C- in my life. No- he didn't expect me to as _good_; he expected me to be _better_. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.**

"You'll learn them eventually," Jaycee said.

**I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girls funeral.**

"He was," Ray said," I am sure of it."

"He was," Cayden said," He told me about it. And I really don't feel like telling the story since I forgot most of the details."

"Of course you did," I said. He opened his mouth to repley but thought better of it.

**The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue. Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city.**

"Well," Ray said," Somebody was mad."

**I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.**

"Somebody else is mad," Ray said.

"I wonder why," Jaycee said.

**Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.**

"I hate teachers that do that," I said.

"You're not the only one," Ella mumbled.

**Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't think we were from _that_ school- the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.**

**"Detention?" Grover asked.**

**"Nah," I said," Not from Brunner**

**ner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean- I'm not a genius."**

"True that," Sami whispered.

**Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said,"Can I have your apple?"**

All the boys burst out laughing. Dylan was laughing so hard he had tears coming out of his eyes. "I love that dude," Dylan said.

**I didn't have munch of an appetite, so I let him take it.**

**I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought of about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.**

"Wow," Shay said," Six schools in six years. He's worse than me."

**Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe table.**

Cue for more laughter from everyone. This guy is hilarious.

**I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends-**

"I can't believe she has friends!" Sami shouted.

"I can't believe it either," Ella said.

**I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists- and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap. "Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.**

"Now I won't be able to look at Cheetos the same way ever again," Cayden said.

"Me too," Jaycee mumbled," And I really loved that food."

**I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times,"Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank.**

'Oh shit,' Sami thought,'Come on Percy. Don't do anything stupid. But knowing you, you will.'

**A wave roared in my ears.**

"A wave?" Dylan asked confused.

"Apparently," I said in disbelief.

**I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming,"Percy pushed me!"**

**Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.**

**Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see-"**

**"-the water-"**

**"-like it grabbed her-"**

"Wow," I exclaimed.

"I wonder," Ella said thinking hard.

"We won't know till later," Sami said quickly.

**I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.**

**As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey-"**

**"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."**

"Not the right thing to say dude!" Ray yelled," Take it from experience."

"He can't hear you Ray," I said.

"I know but still."

**That wasn't the right thing to say.**

"See what I mean! He agreed with me!"

"He sure did," Ella said.

**"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.**

**"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her."**

**I started at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.**

**She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.**

**"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.**

**"But-"**

**"You-will-stay-here."**

**Grover looked at me desperately.**

**"It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."**

"It's not okay. I can tell," Jaycee said.

"Me too," Nathan said.

**"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at me. "Now."**

**Nancy Bobofit smirked. I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare.**

"I bet she was scared," Sami said shaking her head.

**Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.**

**How'd she get there so fast?**

**I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle pieve fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, me brain misinterpreting things.**  
><strong>I wasn't so sure.<strong>

"Me either," Cayden said.

**I went after Mrs. Dodds. Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.**

**I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappered again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.**

**Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop. But apparently that wasn't the plan.**

"If only it was," Ella said.

"But it's not," Shay said.

**I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.**

**Expect for us, the gallery was empty.**

"That's never good," Dylan said.

"You got that right," Sami said looking pale again.

**Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greeek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.**  
><strong>Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird beening alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...<strong>

**"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.**

"Please stop saying honey. Its creppy," Ray said.

"I don't think she will bro," Dylan said.

"Worth a shot," he grumbled.

**She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"**

**The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.**

**She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me. **

"Fat chance of that happening," Sami said. We all nodded.

**I said," I'll-I'll try harder, ma'ma."**

**Thunder shook the building.**

**"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."**

"What the heck is she talking about?" Shay said.

"I have no idea," I said.

**I didn't know what she was talking about.**

**All I could think was that teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to atake away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.**

"Man," Nathan said pointing at Ray," He's worse than you."

"I can't believe it either," Ray said smiling like a lunatic.

**"Well?" she demanded.**

**"Ma'am, I don't..."**

**"Your time is up," she hissed.**

**Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.**

"A fury! For his first monster?" Jaycee asked in disabelf.

"I guess so," I said.

"His dead meat," Dylan said earning a slap from everbody around him.

**Then things got even stranger.**

**Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a mintue before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.**

"What will a pen do? It won't do much good," Ella said in disbelief.

"You'll see," Sami whispered to herself.

**I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword- Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.**

"Thats so cool! I wish my dagger could do that," Dylan yelled.

"It is pretty cool," Jaycee said.

"Ditto," Shay said.

**Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes. My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.**

"Don't drop the sword dude!" Nathan exclaimed. "Cause then your dead meat."

"Just shut up and lets hear what is going to happen," I snarled.

She snarled,"Die, honey!" And she flew straight at me.

**Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.**

"Good job," Ray said," Maybe you killed her."

"Lets hope so," Cayden said.

**The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she was made of water. _Hisss!_**

**Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot,**

"And strike three! She's out of here!" Shay said jumping out of his seat making an You're-Out motion. Whenever he has a chance, he will make a baseball reference.

"Shay sit down," I said laughing my head off. The others followed my example. He sat down blusing madly.

**leaving nothing but the smell of sulfer and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.**

**I was alone.**

**There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.**

**Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was but me.**

**My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.**

"Magic mushrooms?" I said," Is he crazy or something?"

"Maybe," Sami said.

**Had I imagined the whole thing? I went back outside.**

**It had started to rain.**

"Zeus must have been mad that day," Dylan said," I wonder why."

"It might say later in the book," Nathan said.

**Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to ger ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."**

"Who is that?" Nathan said.

"It must be the mist," I said.

**I said, "Who?"**

**"Our teacher. Duh!"**

**I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.**

**She just rolled her eyes and turned away.**

"Definitely the mist," I said.

"I hate the mist," Cayden said. We all ended up nodded.

**I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.**

**He said,"Who?"**

**But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.**

"He's a bad lair," Nathan said.

"Really bad lair," Dylan said.

**"Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious." Thunder boomed overhead.**

**I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.**

**I went over to him.**

**He looked up, a little distracted.**

"I wonder why?" Shay said.

"Maybe it was just what happened a second before?" Sami said. I am pretty sure she was right.

**"Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing untensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."**

**I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it. "Sir," I said," where's Mrs. Dodds?"**

**He stared at me blankly, "Who?"**

"At least he is a better liar," Cayden said.

"Yea he had exprinced lying to us," Ray said.

**"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."**

**He frowned and sat foward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Acadmey. Are you feeling all right?"**

"And thats the end of the chapter," I said heading the book to Sami.

"Like do I start right now or do we take a quick break?" Sami asked.

"Lets start right now," Shay said.

"I figured that," she said sadly and opened the book to right page and started to read.

* * *

><p><strong>Did you like it? Review please. I tried to make Thaila be more happy. So anyways review pretty please! If you were wondering why I didn't upload sooner is because on Friday, I went to see Paronmoral Activty 3 with my 2 friends, and we had a sleepover. Than on Saturday, I hung out with them till like 3. I wrote most of it but I didn't finish all the writing. Yesterday I fininaly finish it and was editing it on here and I was almost done, when I accidently closed the window and I had to start all over again. I tried to upload it before I went trick or treating but I wasn't able to till now. That was a long excuse. Do you even read the auther notes? Tell me if you do. Don't know when I will update again but till than, BYE! Oh and Happy Halloween. You are never to old to Trick or Treat.<strong>

**~sciencelover**


	3. KnitTheSocksOfDeath

**Are you guys ready for chapter 3? Well I think you are. I hope you like. P.S. I have some important infomation for you at the bottom.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 3<p>

Sami

"**Three Old Ladies Knit the Socks of Death**," I read aloud.

"That doesn't sound good," Ray exclaimed.

"When do three old ladies who knit socks of death every sound good?" Talia yelled.

"Touche."

**I was used to the occasional weird experience, but usually they were over quickly. This twenty-four/seven hallucination was more than I could handle. For the rest of the school year, the entire campus seemed to be playing some kind of trick on me. **

"It's just the mist. Not a hallucination," Shay said.

"He doesn't know that idiot," Jaycee said while hitting him on the side of the head.

**The students acted as if they were completely and totally convinced that Mrs. Kerr- a perky blond woman whom I'd never seen in my life until she got on our bus at the end of the field trip- had been our pr-algebra teacher since Christmas. **

**Every so often I would spring a Mrs. Dodds reference on somebody, just to see if I could trip them up, but they would stare at me like I was psycho. **

"Almost everyone here is psycho in their own way," Nathan said.

"Mostly you," Ella said with her crazy smile.

"Hey!"

"It is true," Dylan stated.

"Agreed," Cayden said.

"Meanies," Nathan grumbled.

**It got so I almost believed them- Mrs. Dodds had never existed. **

**Almost. **

**But Grover couldn't fool me. When I mentioned the name Dodds to him, he would hesitate, then claim she didn't exist. But I knew he was lying. **

**Something was going on. Something had happened at the museum. **

"Defiantly the mist," Dylan said stating the obvious.

"Really? I thought it was magical unicorns," Talia said with way too much sarcasm.

**I didn't have much time to think about it during the days, but at night, visions of Mrs, Dodds with talons and leathery wings would wake me up in a cold sweat. **

**The freak weather continued, which didn't help my mood. One night, a thunderstorm blew out the windows in my dorm room. A few days later, the biggest tornado ever spotted in the Hudson Valley touched down only fifty miles from Yancy Academy. One of the current events we studied in social studies class was the unusual number of small planes that had gone down in sudden squalls in the Atlantic that year. **

"They must have been really mad," Cayden stated.

"They probably are fighting with each other," Shay said.

"Intelligent comment for once in your life Shay," I smirked.

"Hey! You just got here. How would you even know that?"

"Just hearing your comments while reading this told me."

"Dude you just got burned," Ray cheered with too much enthusiasm.

**I started feeling cranky and irritable most of the time. My grades slipped from Ds to Fs. I got into more fights with Nancy Bobofit and her friends. I was sent out into the hallway in almost every class. **

**Finally, when our English teacher, Mr. Nicoll, asked me for the millionth time why I was too lazy to study for spelling tests, I snapped. **

"Of course he did," Ella said.

**I called him an old sot. I wasn't even sure what it meant, but it sounded good. **

**The headmaster sent my mom a letter the following week, making it official: I would not be invited back next year to Yancy Academy. **

**Fine, I told myself. Just fine. **

**I was homesick. **

"I would be too," Nathan said.

"Ditto," Jaycee agreed.

**I wanted to be with my mom in our little apartment on the Upper East Side, even if I had to go to public school and put up with my obnoxious stepfather and his stupid poker parties. **

"I hate poker," Talia grumbled.

"Only because we beat you ever time we play," Dylan exclaimed giving Cayden a high-five.

**And yet... there were things I'd miss about Yancy. The view of the woods out my dorm window, the Hudson River in the distance, the smell of pine trees. I'd miss Grover, who'd been a good friend, even if he was a little strange. I worried how he'd survive next year without me. **

"I don't think he will be going there next year," I said.

**I'd miss Latin class, too-Mr. Brunner's crazy tournament days and his faith that I could do well. **

**As exam week got closer, Latin was the only test I studied for. I hadn't forgotten what Mr. Brunner had told me about this subject being life-and-death for me. I wasn't sure why, but I'd started to believe him. **

"You were going to need to if you want to survive," Shay said.

"He will find out soon enough," I said. That was pretty ironic since it was life-and-death for him. He almost died countless times without the help from others. Mostly with the help from Annabeth. If only they were still alive.

**The evening before my final, I got so frustrated I threw the **_**Cambridge Guide to Greek Mythology **_**across my dorm room. Words had started swimming of the page, circling my head, the letters going one-eighties as if they were riding skateboards. **

I smirked at Percy's strange way of describing things while the others laughed.

"I never thought of dyslexia that way before," Dylan said while laughing at the same time.

**There was no way I was going to remember the difference between Chiron and Charon, or Polydictes and Polydeuces. And conjugating those Latin verbs? Forget it. **

**I paced the room, feeling like ants were crawling around inside my shirt. **

**I remembered Mr. Brunner's serious expression, his thousand-year-old eyes. **_**I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson. **_

**I took a deep breath. I picked up the mythology book. **

**I never asked a teacher for help before. **

"I never would do that," Shay mumbled.

"And that's why you fail every class," Jaycee said.

**Maybe if I talked to Mr. Brunner, he could give me some pointers. At least I could apologize for the big fat F I was about to score on his exam. I didn't want to leave Yancy Academy with him thinking I hadn't tried. **

**I walked downstairs to the faculty offices. Most of them were dark and empty, but Mr. Brunner's door was afar, light from his window his window stretching across the hallway floor. **

**I was three steps from the door handle when I heard voices inside the office. Mr. Brunner asked a question. A voice that was definitely Grover's said "...worried about Percy, sir." **

"I would hate too be in his shoes," Nathan said," Especially if it was my friend talking to an adult about me."

"Who wouldn't?" I asked.

"Freaks."

**I froze. **

**I'm not usually an eavesdropper, **

I snorted at that. Fat chance of that Percy. What about the time you eavesdropped on Zoe and Bianca?

**but I dare you to try not listening if you hear your best friend talking about you to an adult. **

**I inched closer. **

**"... alone this summer," Grover was saying. "I mean, a Kindly One in the school! Now that we know for sure, and they know too-" **

**"We would only make matters worse by rushing him," Mr. Brunner said. "We need the boy to mature more." **

"Most of them never do," Ella said glaring at Dylan and Ray.

"Hey!" the said in unison.

"It is so true though," she said while shrugging like it didn't matter.

**"But he may not have time. The summer solstice deadline-" **

**"Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can." **

**"Sir, he saw her..." **

**"His imagination," Mr. Brunner insisted. "The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that." **

"You may want to rethink that since Grover can't lie," Ray said.

**"Sir, I...I can't fail in my duties again." **

I started to choke up at that. I can't believe he thought he had fail. _Grover you didn't fail. _

"I wonder what happened," Jaycee wondered out loud.

"Me too," Talia said.

**Grover's voice was choked with emotion. "You know what that would mean." **

**"You haven't failed, Grover," Mr. Brunner said kindly. "I should have seen her for what she was. Now let's just worry about keeping Percy alive until next fall-" **

**The mythology book dropped out of my hand and hit the floor with a thud. **

"Dude!" Dylan screamed," You never give yourself away when eavesdropping!"

"You probably would have done the same thing," Shay told him.

Both Talia and Jaycee gave me a look to continue like now.

**Mr. Brunner went silent. **

**My heart hammering, I picked up the book and backed down the hall. **

**A shadow slid across the lighted glass of Brunner's office door, the shadow of something much taller than my wheelchair-bound teacher, holding something that looked suspiciously like an archer's bow. **

"Mr. Brunner is diffidently Chiron," Ella said.

**I opened the nearest door and slipped inside. **

**A few seconds later I heard a slow clop-clop-clop, like muffled wood blocks, then a sound like an animal snuffling right outside my door. A large, dark shape passed in front of the glass, then moved on. **

**A bead of sweat trickled down my neck. **

"Sweating means your nervous," Ray said.

"So you're nervous all the time then?" Shay asked with a smile twitching on his face.

"No! I meant when you are nervous when you're hiding!" he protested.

"Sure you did."

**Somewhere in the hallway, Mr. Brunner spoke. "Nothing," he murmured. "My nerves haven't been right since the winter solstice." **

**"Mine neither," Grover said. "But I could have sworn..." **

**"Go back to the dorm," Mr. Brunner told him. "You've got a long day of exams tomorrow." **

"I hate exams," Cayden grumbled.

"Me too," Talia said.

**"Don't remind me." **

**The lights went out in Mr. Brunner's office. **

**I waited in the dark for what seemed like forever. **

**Finally, I slipped out into the hallway and made my way back up to the dorm. **

**Grover was lying on his bed, studying his Latin exam noted like he'd been there all night. **

"But he wasn't," Nathan mumbled.

"We know that," I said.

**"Hey," he said, bleary-eyed. "you going to be ready for this test?" **

**I didn't answer. **

**"You look awful." He frowned. "Is everything okay?" **

**"Just...tired." **

**I turned so he couldn't read my expression, **

I snorted. "Fat chance of that. Satyrs are excellent at reading emotions."

**and started getting ready for bed. **

**I didn't understand what I'd heard downstairs. I wanted to believe I'd imagined the whole thing. **

"I don't think he could imagine that," Dylan said.

"I couldn't even imagine that," Shay mumbled.

**But one thing was clear: Grover and Mr. Brunner were talking about me behind my back. They thought I was in some kind of danger. **

**The next afternoon, as I was leaving the three-hour Latin exam, **

"Three hours?" Cayden said in disbelief.

"That must have sucked eggs," Dylan said.

"Of course it did," I said.

**my eyes swimming with all the Greek and Roman names I'd misspelled, Mr. Brunner called me back inside. **

**For a moment, I was worried he'd found out about my eavesdropping the night before, but that didn't seem to be the problem. **

**"Percy," he said. "Don't be discouraged about leaving Yancy. It's...it's for the best." **

"Straight to the point now," Jaycee grumbled.

**His tone was kind, but the words still embarrassed me. Even though he was speaking quietly, the other kids finishing the test could hear. Nancy Bobofit smirked at me and made sarcastic little kissing motions with her lips. **

"I really don't like that girl," Talia said while clutching her fist together.

"Ditto," we all said.

**I mumbled, "Okay, sir." **

**"I mean..." Mr. Brunner wheeled his chair back and forth, like he wasn't sure what to say. "This isn't the right place for you. It was only a matter of time." **

**My eyes stung. **

**Here was my favorite teacher, in front of the class, telling me I couldn't handle it. After saying he believed in me all year, now he was telling me I was destined to get kicked out. **

"Chiron needs to work on his letting down skills," Shay said.

**"Right," I said, trembling. **

**"No, no," Mr. Brunner said. "Oh, confound it all. What I'm trying to say... you're not normal, Percy. That's nothing to-" **

**"Thanks," I blurted. "Thanks a lot, sir, for, reminding me." **

"He took that the wrong way," Dylan said.

"No dip Sherlock," I told him.

"Touche."

**"Percy-" **

**But I was already gone. **

**On the last day of the term, I shoved my clothed into my suitcase. **

**The other guys were joking around, talking about their vacation plans. One of them was going on a hiking trip to Switzerland. Another was cruising the Caribbean for a month. They were juvenile delinquents, like me, but they were rich juvenile delinquents. Their daddies were executives, or ambassadors, or celebrities. I was a nobody, from a family of nobodies. **

"Aw Percy," Ella said," I'm sure that's not true."

_Yea Percy. Why would you say that? Your mom and step dad Paul are the best. _

**They asked me what I'd be doing this summer and I told them I was going back to the city. **

**What I didn't tell them was that I'd have to get a summer job walking dogs or selling magazine subscriptions, and spend my free time worrying about where I'd go to school in the fall. **

"I bet that wouldn't even happen," Cayden said.

"You're probably right," Dylan said nodding his head.

**"Oh," one of the guys said. "That's cool." **

**They went back to their conversation as if I'd never existed. **

"Meanies," I grumbled.

**The only person I dreaded saying good-bye to was Grover, but as it turned out, I didn't have to. He'd booked a ticket to Manhattan on the same Greyhound as I had, so there we were, together again, heading into the city. **

**During the whole bus ride, Grover kept glancing nervously down the aisle, watching the other passengers. **

"Looking for monsters I bet," Shay grumbled.

"No really?" Talia asked sarcastically.

**It occurred to me that he'd always acted nervous and fidgety when we left Yancy, as if he expected something bad to happen. Before, I'd always assumed he was worried about getting teased. But there was nobody to tease him on the Greyhound. **

**Finally I couldn't stand it anymore. **

**I said, "Looking for Kindly Ones?" **

"Now you done it," I said.

**Grover nearly jumped out of his seat. "Wha- what do you mean?" **

**I confessed about eavesdropping on him and Mr. Brunner the night before the exam. **

"Dude! You never confess to eavesdropping," Ray yelled.

"You know you're talking to a book right?" Nathan asked.

"Whatever," Ray said sitting down real fast.

**Grover's eye twitched. "How much did you hear?" **

**"Oh ... not much. What's the summer solstice deadline?" **

**He winced. "Look, Percy...I was just worried for you, see? I mean, hallucinating about demon math teacher..." **

"He's a really bad liar," Dylan said. I nodded sadly.

**"Grover-" **

**"And I was telling Mr. Brunner that maybe you were overstressed or something, because there was no such person as Mrs. Dodds, and..." **

**"Grover, you're a really, really bad liar." **

"He even agrees with me," Dylan grumbled.

**His ears turned pink. **

**From his shirt pocket, he fished out a grubby business card. "Just take this, okay? In case you need me this summer." **

**The card was in fancy scrip, which was murder on my dyslexic eyes,**

"Interesting way to describe it," I said while that others either laughed or smirked. Shay was laughing so hard he fell off his seat.

**but I finally made out something like: **

**Grover Underwood **

**Keeper **

**Half-Blood Hill **

**Long Island, New York **

**(800) 009-0009 **

"I always wondered why it was called Half-Blood Hill," Shay said. _Wait. Chiron never told them why it was called Half-Blood Hill? _

"I wish Chiron would tell us. He would always tell me we would find out when it really matters to know," Talia informed him._ Hm. Should I tell them why? Nah since it involves telling them who I really are. Besides, I think someone will tell Percy about it soon. _

**"What's Half-" **

**"Don't say it aloud!" he yelped. "That's my, um...summer address." **

**My heart sank. Grover had a summer home. I'd never considered that his family might be as rich as the others at Yancy. **

"I don't think he is rich," Dylan said.

**"Okay," I said glumly. "So, like, of I want to come visit you mansion." **

**He nodded. "Or...or if you need me." **

**"Why would I need you?"**

"Harsh! You never say that to your best friend," Ella said.

"It was pretty cruel," I said.

**It came out harsher then I meant it to. **

**Grover blushed right down to his Adam's apple. "Look, Percy, the truth is, I-I kind of have to protect you." **

"Straight forward apparently," Shay said.

**I stared at him. **

**All year long, I'd gotten in fights, keeping bullies away from him. I'd lost sleep worrying that he'd get beaten up next year without me. **

"Aw that's so sweat," Ella said.

**And here he was acting like he was the one who defended me. **

**"Grover," I said," what exactly are you protecting me from?" **

**There was a huge grinding noise under our feet. Black smoke poured from the dashboard and the whole bus filled with a smell of rotten eggs. **

"I did not need to know that," Dylan said.

"Baby. I want to know what will happen and you are cringing on the mention of rotten eggs," Talia said.

"Hey!"

"I agree with Talia," I said suppressing a grin.

"Ditto," Ray said earning a glare from his brother.

**The driver cursed and limped the Greyhound over to the side of the highway. **

**After a few minutes clanking around in the engine compartment, the driver announced that we'd all have to get off. Grover and I filed outside with everybody else. **

**We were on a stretch of country road-no place you'd notice if you didn't break down there. **

"It's kinda true. Nobody even sees my house unless they break down in front of it. And that happens like twice a week," Jaycee said sadly.

**On our side of the highway was nothing but maple trees and litter from passing cars. On the other side, across four lanes of asphalt shimmering with afternoon heat, was an old-fashioned fruit stand. **

**The stuff on sale looked really good: heaping boxes of blood cherries and apples, walnuts and apricots, jugs of cider in a claw-foot tub full of ice. **

"I love cider!" Nathan said. Suddenly he brought out a gallon of cider and drank it right from the container. **(A/N: LOL! I was hanging out with my friend in her front yard watching her sister and our other friend video tape themselfs dancing when her one neighbor was walking down the street with her other neighbor. Her one neighbor was walking down the street with a gallon of ice tea drinking it from the container. He is a true redneck I tell. Off topic sorry. Back to the story!)**

"Where did that come from?" I asked.

"I brought it knowing I would get thirsty." He shrugged like it was no big deal and continue drinking from it.

"He does that all the time," Talia whispered to me.

**There were no customers, just three old ladies sitting in rocking chairs in the shade of a maple tree, knitting the biggest pair of socks I'd ever seen. **

**I mean these socks were the size of sweaters, but they were clearly socks. The lady on the right knitted one of them. The lady on the left knitted the other. The lady in the middle held an enormous basket of electric-blue yarn. **

**All three women looked ancient, with pale faces wrinkled like fruit leather, silver hair tied back in white bandannas, bony arms sticking out of bleached cotton dresses. **

_No it can't be. I mean, it couldn't be them. _

**The weirdest thing was, they seemed to be looking right at me. **

**I looked over a t Grover to say something about this and saw that the blood had drained form his face. His nose was twitching. **

"That's never a good sign," Cayden said.

"No dip Einstein," I told him.

**"Grover?" I said. "Hey, man-" **

**"Tell me they're not looking at you. They are, aren't they?" **

**"Yeah. Weird, huh? You think those socks would fit me?" **

We all gave a slit chuckle at that. I can't believe he would say something like that at a time like that.

**"Not funny, Percy. Not funny at all." **

**The old lady in the middle took out a long pair of scissors- gold and silver, long-bladed, like shears. I heard Grover catch his breath. **

"Oh crap. He has really bad luck," Shay grumbled._ It can't be about him. He was part of the first and second Great Prophcy. _

**"We're getting on the bus," he told me. "Come on." **

**"What?" I said. "It's a thousand degrees in there." **

**"Come on!" He pried open the door and climbed inside, but I stayed back. **

"Get on the bus man!" Ray yelled," Don't wait around and watch the old ladies!"

"Ray calm down," Ella said," We can't change what happen in the past."

"Fine."

**Across the road, the old ladies were still watching me. The middle on cut the yarn, and I swear I could hear that snip across four lanes of traffic. Her two friends balled up the electric-blue socks, leaving me wondering who they could possibly be for- Sasquatch or Godzilla. **

"He does have a way of breaking the tension," Talia stated.

"I vote for Godzilla!" Shay yelled.

"I vote for Sasquatch!" Nathan yelled.

"Childish of both of you," Ella said.

**At the rear of the bus, the driver wrenched a big chunk of smoking metal out of the engine compartment. The bus shuddered, and the engine roared back to life. **

**The passengers cheered. **

**"Darn right!" yelled the driver. He slapped the bus with his hat. "Everybody back on board!" **

**Once we got going, I started feeling feverish, as if I'd caught the flu. **

**Grover didn't look much better. He was shivering and his teeth were chattering. **

"I think he knew who the old ladies were," Jaycee said.

"He probably does," I said.

**"Grover?" **

**"Yeah?" **

**"What are you not telling me?" **

"And he drawed him in," Dylan said.

"He sure did," Cayden said.

**He dabbed his forehead with his shirt sleeve. "Percy, what did you see back at the fruit stand?" **

**"You mean the old ladies? What is it about them, man? They're not like... Mrs. Dodds, are they?" **

"Their much, much worse," I whispered. The others nodded in agreement.

**His expression was hard to read, but I got the feeling that the fruit-stand ladies were something much, much worse than Mrs. Dodds. **

"Looks like you and Percy think alike," Ray said. _Well we are cousins_. But I didn't say that aloud.

**He said, "Just tell me what you saw." **

**"The middle one took out her scissors, and she cut the yarn." **

**He closed his eyes and made a gesture with his fingers that might've been crossing himself, but it wasn't. It was something else, something almost-older**.

"Good observation," Shay stated.

**He said, "You saw her snip the cord." **

**"Yeah. So?" But even as I said it, I knew it was a big deal. **

"No dip Sherlock," Nathan said.

**"This is not happening," Grover mumbled. He started chewing his thumb. "I don't want this to be like the last time."**

"What last time?" Jaycee asked. I sighed a mental sad sigh in my head. _Don't think like that Grover! I came back to life in a way. _

**"What last time?" **

**"Always sixth grade. They never ger past sixth grade." **

**"Grover," I said, because he was really starting to scare me. "What are you talking about?" **

"Only how must demigods never make it to Camp Half-Blood in time and get killed by monsters," Cayden said earning a slap to the back of the head from Talia.

**"Let me walk you home from the bus station. Promise me." **

**This seemed like a strange request to me, but I promised he could. **

"That was kinda stalkerish," Ella said.

**"Is this like a superstition or something?" I asked. **

**No answer. **

**"Grover-that snipping of the yarn. Does that mean somebody is going to die?" **

"Irony aleart," Dylan said.

"Idiot," Jaycee told him.

**He looked at me mournfully, like he was already picking the kind of flowers I'd like best on my coffin. **

"That's the end of the chapter," I said closing the book.

"Let's go get some lunch and start the thrid chapter after we're done," Talia said standing. Everyone else nodded and stood up while I just sat there.

"Sami are you going to come with us?" Talia asked looking concern.

"Yea. Sorry I just have a lot on my mind," I said standing up to follow them.

"It's okay. Let's go. I am hungry," Ella said.

_I hope they figure out the truth soon. I want them to know the truth like now. Why did Lord Apollo want them to figure out the truth by themselfs?_

"Coming," I said following them to the commons area.

* * *

><p><strong>Review please! Oh and check out my poll on my profile to find out what chapter they will find out Sami is really Thalia. It had to be before the chapter Grover tells Precy about the empty cabins and why Half-Blood hill is called that. If you don't have a account, just tell me in your review. The choices are below:<strong>

***Grover Unexpectedly Loses His Pants**

***My Mother Teaches Me Bullfighting**

***I Play Pinochle with a Horse**

***I Become Supreme Lord of the Bathroom**

***My Dinner Goes Up In Smoke**

**So please vote. I might upload a new chapter soon but it won't them reading just a little fill in chapter I guess. IF I want to do that. The poll will close Monday, Nov. 14 at um whatever time I close it. Please vote! **

**~ "I wasn't that drunk!" "Dude! You threw my hamster saying 'GO Pikachu'" Lol story but I laughed when I saw that. Bye!**

**~sciencelover**


	4. A Little Conversation

**I know what you are probably thinking. _A new chapter so soon?_ Well yes it is a new chapter but it is not about them reading the books. I thought I do a chapter showing you what Artemis thinks how Thalia is doing. Plus I got bored and wanted to write a new chapter but I can't write the one where they are reading a new chapter till I get more votes. So vote!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 4<p>

Narrator

Artemis watched her hunter walk to the commons area with her new friends. It did her some good knowing that Thalia was trying to act happy while reading the books about her friends(and hers) adventures. But she knew Thalia would break down at some point causing some suspicion between Chiron's new star group. No that wasn't the right word. Just a group of friends that were closer than a team of volleyball players. Why would she say volleyball? We all knew she would never be seen in short spandex shorts.

"How do you think she is handling it," a voice said behind her, scaring the crap of her. What do you expect? She was in the form of a 12 year old girl and it is not always fun having someone sneak up behind you.

"Oh Chiron it's just you," Artemis said when she saw who it was.

"How do you think she is taking it?" Chiron asked watching them take their lunch and sit down at a table all together. Today was one of those free days he had every once in awhile letting the campers sit wherever and with whoever they want.

"I really have no idea," she admitted. "At some points she seems fine but at others, she seems to be holding everything in."

"I know it is hard for her but she will be just fine."

"How do you know?"

"Cause she is a strong girl that has you as a leader." Artemis blushed at that.

"Thanks Chiron. You said some really nice things for a guy," Artemis said with a smile.

"Why thank you," Chiron said with a smile. "Hopefully they figure out the truth soon without Thalia revealing it."

"I hope so too. I better get back to my Hunters."

"I will see you soon Artemis."

"Same for you Chiron." She saw him walk away, waving. She waved to him and hopped on her chariot and had her deer take her back to where her hunters were.

* * *

><p><strong>I know some parts were probably a little cheesie but bear with me her. If you find a error please point it out in your review. It lets me know I have to pay attation better. Anyways vote either on my poll on my profile or in your review. Or even both! Here are the choices:<strong>

***Grover Unexpectedly Loses His Pants**

***My Mother Teaches Me Bullfighting**

***I Play Pinochle with a Horse**

***I Become Supreme Lord of the Bathroom**

***My Dinner Goes Up In Smoke**

**The poll will close Monday, Nov. 14 at um whatever time I close it.**

**I might start writing quotes in my author note for now so here is one from one of my favorite book series the _Dreamhouse Kings series_. It is from book two, _Watcher in the Woods_. Read the first book, _House of Dark Shadows_, when you get the chance it is a really good series. If you already read, tell what you thought of the series. Anyways, here is the quote:**

**"If we didn't have strong feelings, how could we love or fight? When our flesh is cut, we bleed. When our heart is broken, we cry. There's nothing wrong with that. It only becomes a problem when it gets in the way of what you have to do. You can't crumble when others are counting on you." **

**Not really a funny one but I liked it and I hope you do too. Peace!**

**~sciencelover**


	5. Grove Unexpectedly Loses His Pants

**Chapter 5 is here! Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 5<p>

Sami

Lunch was really fun. Chiron never let us set anywhere we wanted like over 60 years ago. Some of their friends wanted to join us in reading the books but Ray had to tell them that only us, _only us_, could read the books. They were a little upset but they got over it. We decided to read in Talia's cabin while her siblings were doing their daily activities. We all either sat on the beds or on the floor. I sat on one of the beds with Jaycee and I handed the book to Cayden.

"**Grover Unexpectedly Loses His Pants**," Cayden read earning a few chuckles from everyone.

**Confession time: I ditched Grover as soon as we got to the bus terminal. **

"And he even promised he would wait for him. But did that work? No it didn't," Jaycee huffed.

**I know, I know. It was rude. But Grover was freaking me out, looking at me like I was a dead man, muttering "Why does this always happen?" and "Why does it always have to sixth grade?" **

"That would defiantly creep someone out," Nathan said.

"Hmmm I wonder why? Maybe because he keeps muttering stuff about how he might die!" Talia exclaimed.

**Whenever he got upset, Grover's bladder acted up, so I wasn't surprised when, as soon as we got off the bus, he made me promise to wait for him, then made a beeline for the restroom. Instead of waiting, I got my suitcase, slipped outside, and caught the first taxi uptown. **

**"East One-hundred-and-fourth and First," I told the driver. **

**A word about my mother, before you meet her. **

**Her name is Sally Jackson and she's the best person in the world, **

In my mind, I nodded my head in agreement. Mrs. Jackson was the best.

**which proves my theory that the best people have the rottenest luck. **

"Then that means it applies to us," Shay blurted out loud.

"I think we have bad luck in general," Dylan muttered.

**Her own parents dies in a plane crash when she was five, and she was raised by an uncle who didn't care much about her. She wanted to be a novelist, so she spent high school working to save enough money for a college with a good creative-writing program. Then her uncle got cancer, and she had to quit school her senior year to take care of him. After he died, she was left with no money, no family, and no diploma. **

"That is so sad," I said. _I can't believe she went through all that._

"It really is," Talia agreed.

**The only good break she got was meeting my dad. **

**I don't have any memories of him, just this warm glow, maybe the barest trace of his smile. My mom doesn't like to talk about him because it makes her sad. She has no pictures. **

**See, they weren't married. She told me he was rich and important, and their relationship was a secret. Then one day, he set sail across the Atlantic on some important journey, and he never came back. **

**Lost at sea, my mom told me. Not dead. Lost at sea. **

_So she knew Poseidon was a Greek god when they meet._

"I think-" Ella started to say before I looked at her like _Lets wait and see what will happen_. She looked like she understood what I was getting at.

"You think what?" Ray asked her.

"I think this is about to get interesting," she quickly said.

**She worked odd jobs, took night classes to get her high school diploma, and raised me on her own. She never complained or got mad. Not even once. But I knew I wasn't an easy kid. **

"My dad would tell me almost everyday I wasn't an easy kid," Shay stated.

"We know that already," Jaycee told him causing him to glare at her and make a grrring sound.

**Finally, she married Gabe Ugliano, **

I leaned forward at this. I only heard about Paul never this Gabe person.

**who was nice the first thirty seconds we knew him, then showed his true colors as a world class jerk. When I was young, I nicknamed him Smelly Gabe, I'm sorry, but it's the truth. The guy reeked like moldy garlic pizza wrapped in gym shorts. **

"Ew, that is just plain gross," Talia said.

"When did you become a daughter of Aphrodite?" Nathan asked.

"I can't believe you didn't say it since you are her son," she retorted. Nathan started to say something but apparently he didn't have a good comeback. He just closed his mouth and glared at her.

**Between the two of us, we made my mom's life pretty hard. The way Smelly Gabe treated her, the way he and I got along...well, when i came home is a good example. **

**I walked into our little apartment, hoping my mom would be home from work. Instead, Smelly Gabe was in the living room, playing poker with his buddies. The television blared ESPN. Chips and beer cans were strewn all over the carpet. **

**Hardly looking up, he said around his cigar, "So, you're home." **

"Really? That's what he says when his stepson just came home!" I yelled.

"What a jerk," Dylan said.

"Agreed."

**"Where's my mom?" **

**"Working," he said, "You got any cash?" **

**That was it. No **_**Welcome back. Good to see you. How has your life been the last six months? **_

**Gabe had put on weight. He looked like a tuskless walrus in thrift-store clothes. He has about three hairs on his head, all combed over his bald scalp, as if that made him handsome or something. **

We all cringed at that gross mental picture Percy gave us.

"Not a pretty picture," Ray muttered.

"Like your face isn't pretty either," Dylan whispered failing at it too. Ray just shook his head at him but I think he was planing revenge on his little brother.

**He managed the Electronics Mega-Mart in Queens, but he stayed home most of the time. I don't know why he hadn't been fired long before. He just kept on collecting paychecks, spending the money on cigars that made me nauseous, and on beer, of course. Always beer. Whenever I was home, he expected me to provide his gambling funds. He called that our "guy secret." Meaning if I told my mom, he would punch my lights out. **

"You never hit people," Ella stated," Only if the person is a monster than you can stab them."

"I did not need that picture in my mind," Shay told her and most of us agreed with him.

**"I don't have any cash," I told him. **

**He raised a greasy eyebrow. **

**Gabe could sniff out money like a bloodhound, **

"Why did he compare him to a bloodhound?" Jaycee asked," I have a bloodhound puppy at home and I don't want to look at her think of his step-dad!"

"Then don't think of him like that," Nathan told her.

"_He_ is a girl."

**which was surprising, since his own smell should've covered up everything else. **

**"You took a taxi from the bus station," he said. "Probably paid with a twenty. Got six, seven bucks in change. Somebody expects to live under this roof, he ought to carry his own weight. Am I right, Eddie?" **

"Nope," Cayden said.

"No one asked you," Talia said though she looked like she agreed.

**Eddie, the super of the apartment building, looked at me with a twinge of sympathy. "Come on, Gabe," he said. "The kid just got here." **

**"Am I **_**right**_**?" Gabe repeated. **

**Eddie scowled into his bowl of pretzels. **

"I wish I had pretzels," Shay sighed.

"Me too," Nathan agreed.

"So you have a gallon of cider but you don't have pretzels," I asked in disbelief.

"I am not that much of a freak," he told me.

"He doesn't want to get pretzels crumbs on his outfit," Ray said smirking.

"Hey!" Nathan protested.

**The other two guys passed gas in harmony. **

**"Fine," I said. I dug a was of dollars out of my pocket and threw the money on the table. "I hope you lose." **

**"Your report card came, brain boy!" he shouted after me. **

"Sarcastic much," I muttered remembering how he wasn't that smart at school.

**"I wouldn't act so snooty!" **

**I slammed the door, which really wasn't my room. During the school months, it was Gabe's "study". He didn't study anything in there except old magazines, but he loved shoving my stuff in the closet, leaving his muddy boots on my windowsill, and doing his best to make the place smell like his nasty cologne and cigars and stale beer. **

**I dropped my suitcase on the bed. Home sweet home. **

"More like home not sweet home," Ray grumbled looking disgusted at the description of the room.

**Gabe's smell was almost worse than the nightmares about Mrs. Dodds, or the sound of that old fruit lady's shears snipping the yarn. **

"He must smell repulsive," Jaycee shuddered.

**But as soon as I thought that, my legs felt weak. I remembered Grover's look of panic-how he'd made me promise I wouldn't go home without him. **

"So now he feels guilt," Talia said.

"He deserves it," I grumbled," I can see him getting in trouble because of it."

"If only he listen to Grover," Dylan said sighing.

**A sudden chill rolled through me. I felt like someone-something-was looking for me right now, maybe pounding its way up the stairs, growing long, horrible talons. **

**Then I heard my mom's voice. "Percy?" **

**She opened the bedroom door, and my fears melted. **

Cayden whispered something that I couldn't make out but Talia knew what he said. It most of been bad or disrespectful because he got slapped on the arm.

**My mother can make me feel good just by walking into the room. **

I mentally nodded in agreement.

**Her eyes sparkle and change color in the light. Her smile is warm as a quilt. She's got a few gray streaks mixed in with her long brown hair, but I never think of her as old. When she looks at me, it's like she's seeing all the good things about me, none of the bad. I've never heard her raise her voice or say an unkind word to anyone, not even me or Gabe. **

Most of us gasped in surprise.

"She most have a lot of patience if she wouldn't yell at the disgusting, repulsive, careless-" Ella loudly exclaimed till she was cut off.

"Okay we get it," Ray told her.

**"Oh, Percy." She hugged me tight. "I can't believe it. You've grown since Christmas!" **

**Her red-white-and-blue Sweet on America uniform smelled like the best things in the world: chocolate, licorice, and all the other stuff she sold at the candy shop in Grand Central. **

"They have the best carmel apples in the world," Shay said.

"I prefer their double fudge brownies," I told him.

**She'd brought me a huge bag of "free samples," the way she always did when I came home. **

**We sat together on the edge of the bed. While I attacked the blueberry sour strings, she ran her hand through my hair and demanded to know everything I hadn't put in my letters. She didn't mention anything about my getting expelled. **

"Wish my mom does that," Dylan complained.

**She didn't seem to care about that. But was I okay? Was her little boy doing all right? **

**I told her she was smothering me, and to lay off and all that, but secretly, I was really, really glad to see her.**

**From the other room, Gabe yelled, "Hey Sally-how about some bean dip, huh?"**

"What a jerk," Talia grumbled.

"He deserves to be punished," Ella added.

**I gritted my teeth. **

**My mom is the nicest lady in the world. She should've been married to a millionaire, **

"Briefly dated a god also," Nathan said.

**not some jerk like Gabe. **

**For her sake, I tried to sound upbeat about my last days at Yancy Academy. I told her I wasn't too down about the expulsion. **

_You probably weren't since you be expelled quite a few amount of times. _

**I'd lasted almost the whole year this time. I'd made some new friends. I'd done pretty well in Latin. And honestly, the fights hadn't been as as bad as the headmaster said. **

"They always make them sound worse then what they really were," Shay mumbled.

"Especially when you first started doing spells and making your classmates hair burst into flames," Cayden reminded him smirking.

"ONE TIME! ONE TIME THAT HAPPENED!" We all started cracking up at his sudden outburst causing him to blush madly.

**I liked Yancy Academy. I really did. I put such a good spin on the year, I almost convinced myself. I started chocking up, thinking about Grover and Mr. Brunner. Even Nancy Bobofit suddenly didn't seem so bad. **

**Until that trip to the museum... **

**"What?" my mom asked. Her eyes tugged at my conscience, trying to pull out the secrets. "Did something scare you?" **

"Only a fury and the fates," Cayden mumbled. Cue for a smack from Talia.

**"No, Mom." **

**I felt bad lying.**

_You should be, Percy. _

**I wanted to tell her about Mrs. Dodds and the three old ladies with the yarn, but I thought it would sound stupid. **

**She pursed her lips. She knew I was holding back, but she didn't push me. **

**"I have a surprise for you," she said. "We're going to the beach." **

"I love the beach," Ray said smiling.

"You just like pulling pranks, scaring the beach goers," Ella reminded him.

**My eyes widened. "Montauk?" **

**"Three nights-same cabin." **

**"When?" **

**She smiled. "As soon as I get changed." **

**I couldn't believe it. My mom and I hadn't been to Montauk the last two summers, because Gabe said there wasn't enough money. **

"Of course it would be him," I grumbled.

"He sounds like such a jerk," Cayden agreed with me as did everyone else.

**Gabe appeared in the doorway and growled. "Bean dip, Sally? Didn't you hear me?" **

"Bet she was ignoring you," Shay said.

"I would be too," Jaycee told him.

**I wanted to punch him, but I met my mom's eyes and I understood she was offering me a deal: be nice to Gave for a little while. **

"Good luck with that," Dylan muttered.

**Just until she was ready to leave for Montauk. Then we would get out of here. **

**"I was on my way, honey," she told Gabe. "We were just talking about the trip."**

**Gabe's eyes got small. "The trip? You mean you were serious about that?"**

"Of course she was if she was telling Percy about it." Jaycee shook her head in disbelief at Gabe while she talked.

**"I knew it," I muttered. "He won't let us go." **

**"Of course he will," my mom said evenly. "Your stepfather is just worried about money. That's all. Besides," she added, "Gabriel **

Most of snorted at her his real name.

"Gabriel," Shay said between laughs. "That is just to funny."

**won't have to settle for bean dip. I'll make him enough seven-layer dip for the whole weekend. Guacamole. Sour cream. The works." **

**Gave softened a bit. "So this money for your trip... it comes out of you clothes budget, right?"**

Nathan almost looked horrified at that. Key word: _almost_.

"Worried about clothes their all of a sudden there, Nathan?" Dylan jokingly asked him.

"I am not!" he defended himself. "Just, I thought well, um-"

"So you do then." Nathan put his hands up in defeat causing Dylan to high five Shay in victory.

**"Yes, honey," my mother said.**

**"And you won't take my car anywhere but there and back." **

**"We'll be very careful." **

"Watch that not happen," I said. _Since it is Percy. _

"Demigods always have bad luck," Talia said.

**Gabe scratched his double chin. "Maybe if you hurry with that seven-layer dip...And maybe if the kid apologizes for interrupting my poker game." **

**Maybe if I kick you in your soft spot, I thought. And make you sing soprano for a week. **

"Do it! Do it!" Ray chanted causing the other boys to chant it with him.

"Why don't you be quiet or do I have to make you guys sing soprano for a week?" Jaycee threatened them. They quickly shut up after that.

**But my mom's eyes warned me not to make him mad. **

**Why did she put up with this guy? I wanted to scream. **

"I would want to too," Ella said.

**Why did she care what he thought? **

**"I'm sorry," I muttered. "I'm really sorry I interrupted your incredibly important poker game. Please go back to it right now." **

**Gabe's eyes narrowed. His tiny brain was probably trying to detect sarcasm in my statement. **

**"Yeah, whatever," he decided. **

"Must be smaller than a squirrels," Dylan guessed.

**He went back to his game. **

**"Thank you, Percy," my mom said. "Once we get to Montauk, we'll talk more about... whatever you've forgotten to tell me, okay?" **

_I highly dought he will._

**For a moment, I thought I saw anxiety in her eyes-the same fear I'd seen in Grover during the bus ride **

"That is never good," Shay grumbled.

"No dip Sherlock," Nathan told him.

**-as if my mom too felt an odd chill in the air. **

**But then her smile returned, and I figured I must have been mistaken. She ruffled my hair and went to make Gabe his seven-layer dip. **

**An hour later we were ready to leave. **

"Vacation time," Cayden said.

"Wait and see something bad happened," I grumbled.

**Gabe took a break from his poker game long enough to watch me lug my mom's bags to the car. He kept griping and groaning about losing her cooking **

"He probably doesn't even need food," Dylan muttered.

**-and more important, his '78 Camaro-for the whole weekend. **

**"Not a scratch on this car, brain boy," **

"Brain boy?" Jaycee asked.

"I don't think he will ever be a brain boy," I said. He will never be one.

**he warned me as I loaded the last bag. "Not one little scratch." **

**Like I'd be the one driving. I was twelve. But that didn't matter to Gabe. If a seagull so much as pooped on his paint job, he'd find a way to blame me. **

**Watching him lumber back toward the apartment building, I got so mad I did something I can't explain. As Gabe reached the doorway, I made the hand gesture I'd seen Grover make on the bus, a sort of warding-off-evil gesture, **

"Good observation," Nathan said.

**a clawed hand over my heart, then a shoving movement toward Gabe. The screen door slammed shut so hard it whacked him in the butt and sent him flying up the staircase as if he'd been shot from a cannon. Maybe it was just the wind, or some freak accident with the hinges,**

"Hinges wouldn't do that," Dylan informed us.

"Hepheastus kids could do that though," Cayden told him.

**but I didn't stay long enough to find out. **

**I got in the Camaro and told my mom to step on it. **

**Our rental cabin was on the south shore, way out at the tip of Long Island. It was a little pastel box with faded curtains, half sunken into the dunes. There was always sand in the sheets and spiders in the cabinets, **

"The Athena cabin wouldn't like that place," Ray said with smirk. "Maybe they should go there."

"Don't even think about it," Ella told most of the time the sea was too cold to swim in.

**I loved the place. **

**We'd been going there since I was a baby. My mom had been going even longer. She never exactly said, but I knew why the beach was special to her. It was the place where she'd met my dad. **

"Some of my siblings would be going crazy if they heard that," Nathan said.

"Especially Lilly Ann," Cayden added.

"She goes crazy over romance stories and couples," Jaycee told me.

**As we got closer to Montauk, she seemed to grow younger, years of worry and work disappearing from her face. Her eyes turned the color of the sea. **

**We got there at sunset, opened all the cabin's windows, and went through our usual cleaning routine. We walked on the beach, fed blue corn chips to the seagulls, and munched on blue jelly beans, blue saltwater taffy, **

"What's with all the blue food?" Shay asked.

"Maybe he will explain it," I told him.

"He better."

**and all the other free samples my mom brought from work. **

**I guess I should explain the blue food. **

**See, Gabe had once told my mom there was no such thing.**

"There are blueberries, blue M&Ms, blue frosting-" Shay started.

"Okay we get it," Talia told him.

**They had this fight, which seemed like a really small thing at the time. But ever since, my mom went out of her way to eat blue. She baked blue birthday cakes. She mixed blueberry smoothies. She bought blue-corn tortilla chips and brought home blue candy from the shop. This-along with keeping her maiden name, Jackson, rather than calling herself Mrs. Ugliano- **

"Who would ever want to be Mrs. Ugliano," Ella said looking horrified.

**was proof that she wasn't totally suckered by Gabe. She did have a rebellious streak, like me. **

**When it got dark, we made a fire. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. Mom told me stories about when she was a kid, back before her parents died in the plane crash. She told me about the books she wanted to write someday, when she had enough money to quit the candy shop. **

"Who would want to quit working at a candy shop?" Ray yelled. "Think of all the free samples you get!"

"Maybe because she doesn't like working there," Jaycee told him.

**Eventually, I got up the nerve to ask about what was always on my mind whenever we came to Montauk-my father. Mom's eyes went all misty. I figured she would tell me the same things she always did, but I never got tired of hearing them. **

**"He was kind, Percy," she said. "Tall, handsome, and powerful. But gentle, too. You have his black hair, you know, and his green eyes." **

**Mom fished a blue jelly bean out of candy bag. "I wish he could see you, Percy. He would be so proud." **

**I wondered how she could say that. What was so great about me?**

_You defeated Kronos._

**A dyslexic, hyperactive boy with a D+ report card, kicked out of school for the sixth time in six years. **

**"How old was I?" I asked. "I mean... when he left?" **

**She watched the flames. "He was only with me for one summer, Percy. Right here at this beach. This cabin." **

**"But... he knew me as a baby." **

"Sadly they never do," I said.

"Sometimes you get to meet them too," Dylan added.

**"No, honey. He knew I was expecting a baby, but he never saw you. He had to leave before you were born." **

**I tried to square that with the fact that I seemed to remember... something about my father. A warm glow. A smile. **

**I had always assumed he knew me as a baby. My mom had never said it outright, but still, I'd felt it must be true. Now, to be told that he'd never even seen me... **

**I felt angry at my father. **

"Who isn't mad at their father," Shay said.

"Shay your dad is mortal not a god," Ray reminded him.

"Then that means I don't have to worry about getting blasted to ashes when I yell at him."

**Maybe it was stupid, but I resented him for going on that ocean voyage, for not having the guts to marry my mom. He'd left us, and now we were stuck with Smelly Gabe. **

**"Are you going to send me away again?" I asked her. "To another boarding school?" **

**She pulled a marshmallow from the fire. **

**"I don't know, honey." Her voice was heavy. "I think... I think we'll have to do something." **

**"Because you don't want me around?" I regretted the words as soon as they were out.**

"You should be," I mumbled.

"They only do it to protect you," Talia said sadly.

**My mom's eyes welled with tears. She took my hand, squeezed it tight. "Oh, Percy, no. I-I **_**have**_** to, honey. For your own good. I have to send you away." **

**Her words reminded me of what Mr. Brunner had said-that it was best for me to leave Yancy. **

"The only reason is to come to camp," Nathan said quietly.

"But camp is pretty fun," Jaycee added.

**"Because I'm not normal," I said. **

**"You say that as if it's a bad thing, Percy. **

"At times it is," Talia said.

"At other times it is really fun," I added.

**But you don't realize how important you are. I thought Yancy Academy would be far enough away. I thought you'd finally be safe." **

**"Safe from what?" **

"Evil monsters," Cayden whispered a little too loud.

**She met my eyes, and a flood of memories came back to me-all weird, scary things that had ever happened to me, some of which I'd tried to forget. **

**During third grade, a man in a black trench coat had stalked me on the playground. **

"Someone has a stalker," Shay yelled.

**When the teachers threatened to call the police, he went away growling, but no one believed me when I told them that under his broad-brimmed hat, the man only had one eye, right in the middle of his head. **

"A cyclops stalker," Nathan corrected.

"Okay someone has a cyclops stalker."

**Before that-a really early memory. I was in preschool, and a teacher accidentally put me down for a nap in a cot that a snake had slithered into. **

"Accidentally," Ella said sarcsatly.

**My mom screamed when she came to pick me up and found me playing with my meaty hands. **

**In every single school, something creepy had happened, something unsafe, and I was forced to move. **

**I knew I should tell my mom about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds at the art museum, about my weird hallucination that I had sliced my math teacher into dust with a sword. But I couldn't make myself tell her. I had a strange feeling the news would end our trip to Montauk, and I didn't want that. **

"It might end anyways," I said.

**"I've tried to keep you as close to me as I could," my mom said. "They told me that was a mistake. But there's only one other option, Percy-the place your father wanted to send you. And I just...I just can't stand to do it." **

**"My father wanted me to go to a special school?" **

**"Not a school," she said softly. "A summer camp." **

"But for some people it isn't a summer camp," Cayden said.

"But for others it is," Talia told him.

**My head was spinning. Why would my dad-who hadn't even stayed around long enough to see me born- talk to my mom about a summer camp? And if it was so important, why hadn't she ever mentioned it before? **

**"I'm sorry, Percy," she said, seeing the look in my eyes. "But I can't talk about it. I-I couldn't send you to that place. It might mean saying good-bye to you for good." **

**"For good? But if it's only a summer camp..." **

**She turned toward the fire, and I knew from her expression that if I asked her any more questions she would start to cry. **

"You don't want to make the situation worse than it already is," Ella said.

**That night I had a vivid dream. **

"I hate dreams," Nathan grumbled. We all agreed with him.

**It was storming on the beach, and two beautiful animals, a white horse and a golden eagle, **

"Zeus and Poseidon," Shay said.

**were trying to kill each other at the edge of the surf. The eagle swooped down and slashed the horse's muzzle with its huge talons. The horse reared up and kicked at the eagle's wings. As they fought, the ground rumbled, and a monstrous voice chuckled somewhere beneath the earth, goading the animal to fight harder. **

"Hades?" Cayden asked.

"I don't don't. Maybe," Jaycee mumbled.

**I ran toward them, knowing I had to stop them from killing each other, but I was running in slow motion. I knew I would be too late. I saw the eagle dive down, its beak aimed at the horse's wide eyes, and I screamed, **_**No**_**! **

**I woke with a start. **

"They can seem pretty realistic," Dylan said.

**Outside, it really was storming, the kind of storm that cracks trees and blows down houses. There was no horse or eagle on the beach, just lightning making false daylight, and twenty-foot waves pounding the dunes like artillery. **

**With the next thunderclap, my mom woke. She sat up, eyes wide, and said, "Hurricane." **

**I knew that was crazy. Long Island never sees hurricanes this early in the summer. But the ocean seemed to have forgotten. **

"Or Poseidon is really mad," Ray said.

"He doesn't know that Ray," Ella told him.

**Over the roar of the wind, I heard a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that made my hair stand on end. **

**Then a much closer noise, like mallets in the sand. A desperate voice-someone yelling, pounding on our cabin door. **

**My mother sprang out of her bed in her nightgown and threw open the lock. **

**Grover stood framed in the doorway against a backdrop of pouring rain. But he wasn't...he wasn't exactly Grover. **

"How can he not be Grover?," Cayden asked.

"I don't know," Talia told him. "I think we will find out soon."

**"Searching all night," he gasped. "What were you thinking?" **

**My mother look at me in terror-not scared of Grover, but why he'd come. **

**"Percy," she said, shouting to be heard over the rain. "What happened at school? What didn't you tell me?" **

"Almost everything," Shay said trying to be mysterious.

"Don't do that again," I told him.

**I was frozen, looking at Grover. I couldn't understand what I was seeing. **

**"**_**O Zeu kai alloi theoi!**_**"****he yelled. "It's right behind me! Didn't you**_** tell **_**her?" **

**I was too shocked to register that he cursed in Ancient Greek, and I'd understood him perfectly. **

"It's in your blood," Nathan said. "You will start to talk and hear things in Ancient Greek pretty soon."

"It is a great way to curse your teacher without getting in trouble," Ray blurted out.

**I was too shocked to wonder how Grover had gotten here by himself in the middle of the night. Because Grover didn't have his pants on-and where his legs should be...where his legs should be... **

**My mom looked at me sternly and talked in a tone she'd never used before: "**_**Percy**_**. Tell me **_**now**_**!" **

**I stammered something about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds, and my mom stared at me, her face deathly pale on the flashes of lightning. **

"She doesn't like the sound of that," I mumbled.

"I wouldn't either," Jaycee agreed with me.

**She grabbed her purse, tossed me my rain jacket, and said, "Get to the car. Both of you. **_**Go**_**!" **

**Grover ran for the Camaro-but he wasn't running, exactly. He was trotting, shaking his shaggy hindquarters, and suddenly his story about a muscular disorder in his legs made sense to me. I understood how he could run so fast and still limp when he walked. **

**Because where his feet should be, there were no feet. There were cloven hooves. **

"And that's the end of the chapter," Cayden told us tossing the book to Nathan.

"Grover is a satyr," Ella yelled.

"No really. I never knew that," Dylan told her sarcastically.

"Did you really figure it out?"

"No," he admitted.

"That's what I thought."

* * *

><p><strong>Okay I finally updated! Hoped you like it. Little mini poll for you to answer in your review: Which is the better couple- PercyAnnabeth or Grover/Juniper? Review, read, I don't care! Have a great day everyone!**

**~sciencelover**


	6. My Mother Teaches Me Bullfighting

**Sorry my readers I have not updated sooner. Please injoy chapter 6, which is 5,038 words long, not including the author notes. Please enjoy chapter 6!**

**Disclaimer- I refuse to say it because I will never own PJO. Rats I said it.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 6<p>

Sami

"**My Mother Teaches Me Bullfighting**," Nathan read.

"We barely started reading and it already sounds bad," Ella said.

I nodded. "It sure seems like it."

**We tore through the night along dark country roads. Wind slammed against the Camaro. **

"Is Zeus trying to prevent them from coming to the camp?" Dylan asked. Thunder was heard outside the cabin, causing him to fall down from the top bunk from where he was sitting. I couldn't help from stopping my laughter, neither could anyone else.

"Glad I could bring you entertainment," he grumbled though he was epically falling at hiding his grin.

**Rain lashed the windshield. I didn't know how my mom could see anything, but she kept her foot on the gas.**

**Every time there was a flash of lightning, I looked at Grover sitting next to me in the backseat and I wondered if I'd gone insane,**

"Maybe a little," I smirked.

**or if he was wearing some kind of shag-carpet pants. But, no, the smell was one I remembered from kindergarten field trips to the petting zoo- lanolin, like from wool. The smell of a wet barnyard animal.**

"I bet satyrs would love to hear that," Shay said while chuckling.

**All I could think to say was, "So, you and my mom…know each other?"**

**Grover's eyes flitted to the rearview mirror, though there were no cars behind us. "Not exactly," he said. "I mean, we've never met in person. But she knew I was watching you."**

"Stalker much?" Nathan asked, chuckling.

"Idiot," Jaycee muttered.

"**Watching me?"**

"**Keeping tabs on you. Making sure you were okay. But I wasn't faking being your friend," he added hastily. "I _am_ your friend."**

"**Um… what _are_ you, exactly?"**

"**That doesn't matter right now."**

"**It doesn't matter? From the waist down, my best friend is a donkey-"**

I couldn't but laugh at Percy's foolishness and neither could everyone else.

"I don't think Grover would like that," Talia said.

**Grover let out a sharp, throaty "_Blaa-ha-ha!_"**

**I'd heard him make that sound before, but I'd always assumed it was a nervous laugh. **

Cayden nodded his head, like in agreement. "Their laugh does sound like that."

**Now I realized it was more of an irritated bleat.**

"**Goat!" he cried.**

"**What?"**

"I think he just told you what he was, or half is," Shay stated.

"Thanks for letting me know," I told him, my voice oozing with sarcasm. He didn't even seem to notice it though.

"No problem."

"**I'm a goat from the waist home."  
><strong>

"**You just said it didn't matter."**

"**_Blaa-ha-ha! _There are satyrs who would trample you underhoof for such an insult!"**

"Not if you tell them that a dryad is looking for them," Ray told us. "It worked every time I did it."

"Not really," Ella reminded him. "You ended up having mud in your bunk and grass in your hair."

"But I did get some really funny photos," Dylan added with a pillow hitting him in the face.

"**Whoa. Wait. Satyrs. You mean like… Mr. Brunner's myths?"**

"**Were those old ladies at the fruit stand a _myth_, Percy? Was Mrs. Dodds a myth?"**

"He had to bring that back up," I grumbled. "You probably are going to freak him out even more."

"**So you _admit_ there was a Mrs. Dodds!"**

"**Of course."**

"**Then why-"**

"**The less you knew, the fewer monsters you'd attract," Grover said, like that should be perfectly obvious.**

"Not when you first learn about being a demigod," Nathan said.

"**We put Mist over the humans' eyes. We hoped you'd think the Kindly One was a hallucination. But it was no good. You started to realize who you are."**

"**Who I- wait a minute, what do you mean?"**

"Oh nothing really. Just that you're a demigod," Cayden remarked.

"You're dating an idiot Talia," Jaycee whispered but it was still loud enough to hear.

"I knew that since we started dating," Talia smirked while Cayden looked offended. I sighed sadly. It was almost like Annabeth calling Percy 'Seaweed Brain'. I guess I sighed kind of loud because Jaycee and Talia gave me a weird look.

**The weird bellowing noise rose up again somewhere behind us, closer than before. Whatever was chasing us was still on our trail.**

"**Percy," my mom said, "there's too much to explain and not enough time. We have to get you to safety."**

"**Safety from what? Who's after me?"**

"**Oh, nobody much," Grover said, obviously still miffed about the donkey comment. "Just the Lord of the Dead and a few of his blood-thirstiest minions."**

I grimaced. First he was after me, now my cousin.

"Not the best way to break the news," Shay said.

"**Grover!"**

"**Sorry, Mrs. Jackson. Could you drive faster, please?"**

**I tried to wrap my mind around what was happening, but I couldn't do it. **

_Of course you couldn't. Your brain is full of seaweed._

**I knew this wasn't a dream. I had no imagination, I could never dream up something this weird.**

**My mom made a hard left. We swerved onto a narrower road, racing past darkened farmhouses and wooded hills and PICK YOUR OWN STRAWBERRIES signs on white picket fences.**

"Sadly you can't though." Dylan actually looked sad as he said that.

"**Where are we going?" I asked**

"**The summer camp I told you about." My mother's voice was tight; she was trying for my sake not to be scared. "The place your father wanted to send you."**

"**The place you didn't want me to go."**

"**Please, dear," my mother begged. "This is hard enough. Try to understand. You're in danger."**

"Just like everyone else around here," Nathan huffed.

"Some are in more danger than others," Ella reminded him. "Some that are more powerful then you."

"**Because some old ladies cut yarn."**

"It's more than just yarn," I said.

"**Those weren't old ladies," Grover said. "Those were the Fates. Do you know what it means-the fact they appeared in front of you? They only do that when you're about to…when someone's about to die."**

"He just said you, like Percy is going to die," Talia said.

Shay nodded. "He needs to learn how to lie better."

"**Whoa. You said 'you'."**

"**No I didn't. I said 'someone.'"**

"**You meant 'you.' As in _me_."**

"**I meant _you_, like 'someone.' Not you, _you_."**

"While Percy is right anyways," Dylan said, stating the obvious.

"**Boys!" my mom said.**

**She pulled the wheel hard to the right, and I got a glimpse of a figure she'd swerved to avoid- a dark fluttering shape now lost behind us in the storm.**

"**What was that?" I asked.**

"**We're almost there," my mother said, ignoring my question. "Another mile. Please. Please. Please."**

"Hopefully they get to camp soon," Nathan said.

"We all hope so too," I told him, seriously hoping they get to the camp.

**I didn't know where there was, but I found myself leaning forward in the car, anticipating, wanting us to arrive.**

**Outside, nothing but rain and darkness-the kind of empty countryside you get way out on the tip of Long Island. I thought about Mrs. Dodds**

"Now why would he ask that?" Jaycee asked no one in particular.

"How would I know?" Dylan demanded.

**and the moment when she'd changed into the thing with pointed teeth and leathery wings. My limbs went numb from delayed shock. She really _hadn't_ been human. She'd meant to kill me.**

"Now he realizes that," I grumbled.

**Then I thought about Mr. Brunner… and the sword he had thrown me. Before I could ask Grover about that, the hair rose on the back of my neck. There was a blinding flash, a jaw-rattling _boom!_, and out car exploded. **

**I remember feeling weightless, like I was being crushed, fried, and hosed down all at the same time.**

"Interesting way to describe it," Ella remarked.

Ray on the other hand looked at the book in Nathan's hand in amazement. "And how would he possibly know all of that?"

**I peeled my forehead off the back of the driver's seat and said, "Ow."**

I mentally slapped my forehead at Percy. Only he would say that, only him.

Talia had a look of disbelief as she said, "Their car just exploded and all he said was 'ow.'"

"**Percy!" my mom shouted.**

"**I'm okay…."**

**I tried to shake off the daze. I wasn't dead. The car hadn't really exploded. We'd swerved into a ditch. Our driver's-side doors were wedged in the mud. The roof had cracked open like an eggshell and rain was pouring in.**

**Lightning. That was the only explanation.**

_Why is my father so mad? Why would he try to explode their car?_

"I wonder why Zeus is so mad," Jaycee asked.

"Don't we all want to know?" Cayden muttered.

**We'd been blasted right off the road. Next to me in the backseat was a big motionless lump. "Grover!"**

**He was slumped over, blood trickling from the side of his mouth. I shook his furry hip, thinking, No! Even if you are half barnyard animal, you're my best friends and I don't want you to die!**

"He is such a good friend," Ella cooed.

Shay nodded his head in agreement. "Sure seems like it." Under his breath he added, "Sometimes you guys probably don't think like that." Dylan hit him outside his head.

**Then he groaned "Food," and I knew there was hope.**

"He knew there was hope when he said food?" Shay asked in disbelief.

"Maybe he knew that from knowing him during the school year." Even as Jaycee told Shay that, she looked like she doubted what she was saying.

"**Percy," my mother said, "we have to…" Her voice faltered. **

**I looked back. In a flash of lightning, through the mud-spattered rear windshield, I saw a figure lumbering toward us on the shoulder of the road. The sight of it made my skin crawl. It was a dark silhouette of a huge guy, like a football player. He seemed to be holding a blanket over his head. His top half was bulky and fuzzy. His upraised hands made it look like he had horns.**

"Oh no," I whispered. "It can't be."

**I swallowed hard. "Who is-"**

"**Percy," my mother said, deadly serious. "Get out of the car."**

**My mother threw herself against the driver's-side door. It was jammed shut in the mud. I tried mine. Stuck too. I looked up desperately at the hole in the roof. It might've been an exit, but the edges were sizzling and smoking. **

"Good thing he didn't try to escape that way," Ray commented. "He could have died before he had a chance of trying to defeat the monster chasing him."

I was about to snap at him but Ella beat me to it. "Now how would you think he be able to defeat a monster, without a weapon, to defend him? Think next time!"

"Okay chill, take a chill pill."

"**Climb out the passenger's side!" my mother told me. "Percy-you have to run. Do you see the big tree?" **

"**What?"**

**Another flash of lightning, and through the smoking hole in the roof I saw the tree she meant: a huge, Whit House Christmas tree-sized pine at the crest of the nearest hill.**

"So when he came to camp, the golden fleece wasn't there," Talia remarked.

"I still wonder why it is there," Nathan told us. "And why the hill is called Half-Blood Hill."

_Oh you will find out soon enough, I think. _

"**That's the property line," my mom said. "Get over that hill and you'll see a big farmhouse down in the valley. Run and don't look back. Yell for help. Don't stop until you reach the door." **

"**Mom, you're coming too."**

"It's going to be tough for him since mortals aren't allowed," Dylan said.

_It will really be hard for Percy since his fatal flaw is personal loyalty. _

**Her face was pale, her eyes as sad as when she looked at the ocean.**

"**No!" I shouted. "You _are_ coming with me. Help me carry Grover." **

"**Food!" Grover moaned, a little louder.**

Ray snorted. "The least he could do is stop moaning help."

"It's not his fault he got blasted to side of the room and has blood coming from the side of his mouth," I defended my friend.

He held up his hands in a surrender gesture, though he had his trade mark Hermes grin plastered on his face.

**The man with the blanket on his head kept coming toward us, making his grunting, snorting noises. As he got closer, I realized he _couldn't_ be holding a blanket over his head, because his hands-huge meaty hands-were swinging at his sides. There was no blanket. Meaning the bulky, fuzzy mass that was too big to be his head…was his head. And the points that looked like horns…**

"**He doesn't want us," my mother told me. "He wants you. Besides, I can't cross the property line." **

"**But…"**

"**We don't have time, Percy. Go. Please."**

"Yes please listen to your mom and RUN!" Shay shouted.

"He needs to get over the property line," Cayden added.

All of us nodded out heads in agreement.

**I got mad, then-mad at my mother, at Grover the goat, at the thing with horns that was lumbering toward us slowly and deliberately like, like a bull.**

**I climbed across Grover and pushed the door open into the rain. "We're going together. Come on, Mom."**

"**I told you-"**

"**Mom! I am not leaving you. Help me with Grover."**

**I didn't wait for her answer. I scrambled outside, dragging Grover from the car. He was surprisingly light,**

_Probably because all Grover ate most of the time was enchiladas and tin cans. _

**but I couldn't have carried him very far if my mom hadn't come to my aid.**

**Together, we draped Grover's arms over our shoulders and started stumbling uphill through wet waist-high grass. **

"I hate how the grass is so high," Jaycee complained. "Most of the time when I walked through there I get bit by mosquito."

"Beware the mini-vampires!" Dylan shouted dramatically.

"Idiot," Ray muttered.

**Glancing back, I got my first clear look at the monster. He was seven feet tall, easy, his arms and legs like something from the cover of _Muscle Man_ magazine-bulging biceps and triceps and a bunch of other 'ceps, all stuffed like baseballs under vein-webbed skin. He wore no clothes except underwear-I mean, bright white Fruit of the Looms-**

"So the monster wears Fruit of the Looms underwear," Nathan chuckled.

"He does have an interesting way of describing things," Talia added.

**which would've looked funny, except that the top half of his body was so scary. Coarse brown hair started at about his belly button and got thicker as it reached his shoulders. **

**His neck was a mass of muscle and fur leading up to his enormous head, which had a snout as long as my arm, snotty nostrils with a gleaming brass ring, cruel black eyes, and horns-enormous black-and-white horns with points you just couldn't get from an electric sharpener. **

"He really thinks about that when he is going to be attacked," Ray said.

"Especially when the monster that is going to attack him is really dangerous," Cayden pointed out.

"Hopefully he makes it to camp before the monster attacks him," Jaycee said.

**I recognized the monster, all right. He had been in one of the first stories Mr. Brunner told us. But he couldn't be real.**

"It's a good thing that he recognizes the monster," I pointed out.

"But he is still in denial," Nathan said.

"You were also in denial about being a demigod, just like everyone else around here," Talia reminded him,

**I blinked the rain out of my eyes. "That's-"**

"**Pasiphae's son," my mother said.**

"Smart woman," Ella commented. "It seems like she did her research."

"**I wish I'd known how badly they want to kill you."**

"**But he's the Min-"**

"**Don't say his name," she warned. "Names have power."**

**The pine tree was still way too far-a hundred yards uphill at least.**

"If you run you could make it," Shay suggested.

"But he wouldn't because he doesn't want to leave his mom and Grover," I told him. I knew it was true because of his fatal flaw.

**I glanced behind me again.**

**The bull-man hunched over our car, looking in the windows-or not looking exactly. More like snuffling, nuzzling. I wasn't sure why he bothered, since we were only about fifty feet away.**

"**Food?" Grover moaned. **

Dylan shook his head. "Now enters the helpless faun who can only say 'food.'" He shut up when I started to glare at him but it did bring a look of confusion to his face.

"**Shhh," I told him. "Mom, what's he doing? Doesn't he see us?"**

"**His sight and hearing are terrible," she said. "He goes by smell. But he'll figure out where we are soon enough."**

**As if on cue, the bull-man bellowed in rage. He picked up Gabe's Camaro by the torn roof, the chassis creaking and groaning. He raised the car over his head and threw it down the road. It slammed into the wet asphalt and skidded in a shower of sparks for about half a mile before coming to a stop. The gas tank exploded. **

**_Not a scratch, _I remembered Gabe saying.**

**Oops.**

"Gabe deserved it," Ella huffed. Everyone one of us shook our heads in agreement.

"Percy does seem happy about that though," Talia add. "Maybe he is a little too happy about that."

"**Percy," my mom said. "When he sees us, he'll charge. Wait until the last second, then jump out of the way-directly sideways. He can't change directions very well once he's charging. Do you understand?"**

"She _really _did her research," Ray said.

"Good thing too," Jaycee agreed. "It could save there lives."

"Let's hope it does," Dylan added.

"**How do you know all this?"**

"**I've been worried about an attack for a long time. I should have expected this. I was selfish, keeping you near me." **

"She shouldn't be feeling selfish," I whispered.

"**Keeping me near you? But-"**

**Another bellow of rage, and the bull-man started tromping uphill.**

**He'd smelled us.**

"So not good," Nathan paled.

_Please, please, pleassse make it to camp._

**The pine tree was only a few more yards, but the hill was getting steeper and slicker, and Grover wasn't getting any lighter.**

**The bull-man closed in. Another few seconds and he'd be on top of us.**

**My mother must've been exhausted, but she shouldered Grover. "Go, Percy! Separate! Remember what I said."**

"Let's hope that works," I said, getting worried for my two best friends and Sally.

Jaycee nodded in agreement. "They need to get to camp!"

"We all are hoping for that," Shay pointed out.

**I didn't want to split up,**

_Of course you didn't._

**but I had the feeling she was right-it was our only chance. I sprinted to the left, turned, and saw the creature bearing down on me. His black eyes glowed with hate. He reeked like rotten meat.**

"He sure does make it seem like you're there with him," Ella noted.

**He lowered his head and charged, those razor-sharp horns aimed straight at my chest.**

**The fear in my stomach made me want to bolt, but that wouldn't work. I could never outrun this thing. So I held my ground, and at the last moment, I jumped to the side. **

"Hopefully it works," Cayden prayed.

"It better work," I said.

**The bull-man stormed past like a freight train, the bellowed with frustration and turned, but not toward me this time, toward my mother, who was setting Grover down in the grass.**

"This is not good," Talia muttered.

"Get out of there!" I yelled.

**We'd reached the crest of the hill. Down the other side I could see a valley, just as my mother said, and the lights of a farmhouse glowing yellow through the rain. But that was half a mile away. We'd never make it. **

"Please stop thinking like that," Shay mumbled.

**The bull-man grunted, pawing the ground. He kept eyeing my mother, **

"Hate to break it to you but she is taken," Ray said, trying to be helpful.

"Now is not the time for jokes!" I yelled at him, even though Percy seems to do that.

**who was now retreating slowly downhill, back toward the road, trying to lead the monster away from Grover.**

"**Run, Percy!" she told me. "I can't go any farther. Run!"**

**But I just stood there, frozen in fear, as the monster charged her. She tried to sidestep, as she'd told me to do, but the monster had learned his lesson.**

"Why did he have to learn his lesson?" Ella asked.

"How would I know?" Dylan demanded.

"I meant-oh never mind." Nathan gulped and started reading fast. I think he started to read ahead and knew what was happening, and it probably wasn't good.

**His hand shot out and grabbed her by the neck as she tried to get away. He lifted her as she struggled, kicking and pummeling the air.**

"**Mom!" **

**She caught my eyes, managed to choke out one last word: "Go!"**

**Then, with an angry roar, the monster closed his fists around my mother's neck, and she dissolved before my eyes, melting into light, a shimmering golden form, as if she were a holographic projection. A blinding flash and she was simply…gone. **

"What!" we all yelled but no one louder then me. _How is this possibly? She can't be gone. She drove Percy, Annabeth, Grover, and I to that one school where we found Nico and Bianca. This is so frustrating! _Tears are now threatened to come, and I really hope they don't.

"**No!"**

**Anger replaced my fear. Newfound strength burned in my limbs-the same rush of energy I'd gotten when Mrs. Dodds grew talons. **

**The bull-man bore down on Grover, who lay helpless in the grass. The monster hunched over, snuffling my best friend, as if he were about to lift Grover up and make him dissolve too.**

**I couldn't allow that.**

_No, you can't allow that. _

**I stripped off my red rain jacket.**

"What the heck is he doing," Cayden wondered.

"**Hey!" I screamed, waving the jacket, running to one side of the monster. "Hey, stupid! Ground beef!"**

"Nice insults," Ray said. "Not!"

"It was okay under the circumstances," Jaycee defended.

"Not really."

"**Raaaarrrr!" The monster turned toward me, shaking his meaty fists.**

**I had an idea-a stupid idea,**

_And it probably was. At least let the plan work. _Right now, I really hope it works. I feel like I could scream my head off.

**but better than no idea at all. I put my back to the big pine tree and waved my red jacket in front of the bull-man, thinking I'd jump out of the way at the last moment. **

**But it didn't happen like that.**

"Of course it didn't," I mumbled.

**The bull-man charged too fast, his arms out to grab me whichever way I tried to dodge.**

**Time slowed down.**

"That always seems to happen in books and movies, I noticed," Nathan said.

"Thanks for that useless piece of information," Talia told him.

**My legs tensed. I couldn't jump sideways, so I leaped straight up, kicking off the creature's head, using it as a springboard, turning in midair, and landing on his neck.**

**How did I do that? I didn't have time to figure it out. A millisecond later, the monster's head slammed into the tree and the impact nearly knocked my teeth out.**

**The bull-man staggered around, trying to shake me. I locked my arms around his horns to keep from being thrown. Thunder and lightning were still going strong. The rain was in my eyes. The smell of rotten meat burned my nostrils. **

"That I didn't need to know," Ella said.

"I kind of like that smell," Ray confessed.

**The monster shook himself around and bucked like a rodeo bull.**

"Well he is part bull," Shay shared.

**He should have just backed up into the tree and smashed me flat, but I was starting to realize that this thing had only on gear: forward.**

**Meanwhile, Grover started groaning in the grass. I wanted to yell at him to shut up, but the way I was getting tossed around, if I opened my mouth I'd bite my own tongue off.**

"**Food!" Grover moaned.**

"Is that all he can say?" Cayden wondered.

"I don't know," Talia told him. "Just be quiet and listen to the story."

"Fine."

**The bull-man wheeled toward him, pawed the ground again,**

"Like a cat!" Jaycee shouted. We all looked at her strangely. "What? I miss my cat."

**and got ready to charge. I thought about how he had squeezed the life out of my mother, made her disappear in a flash of light, and rage filled me like high-octane fuel. I got both hands around one horn and I pulled backward with all my might. The monster tensed, gave a surprised grunt, then-_snap!_**

"Impressive," Cayden whistled.

"Very," I agreed.

**The bull-man screamed and flung me through the air. I landed flat on my back in the grass. My head smacked against a rock. When I sat up, my vision was blurry, but I had a horn in my hands, a ragged bone weapon the size of a knife.**

**The monster charged.**

**Without thinking, I rolled to one side and came up kneeling. As the monster barreled past, I drove the broken horn straight into his side, right up under his furry rib cage.**

Somebody whistled at that. I laid my head on my hands, thinking _I can't believe his luck _and _I can't take this anymore. I know he lives through this but it is still too much to take in. I really need to talk to Chiron after this chapter._

**The bull-man roared in agony. He flailed, clawing at his chest, then began to disintegrate-not like my mother, in a flash of golden light, but like crumbling sand, blown away in chunks by the wind, the same way Mrs. Dodds had burst apart.**

**The monster was gone.**

"Really impressive," Talia said.

**The rain had stopped. The storm still rumbled, but only in the distance. I smelled like livestock and my knees were shaking. My head felt like it was splitting open. I was weak and scared and trembling with grief. I'd just seen my mother vanish. I wanted to lie down and cry, but there was Grover, needing my help, so I managed to haul him up and stagger down into the valley, toward the lights of the farmhouse. I was crying, calling for my mother, but I held on to Grover-I wasn't going to let him go.**

"Really sweet friend," Ella commented.

"He sure seems like it," I said sadly. I really can't take this anymore. Curse you Apollo for making them figure it out.

**The last thing I remembered is collapsing on a wooden porch, looking up at a ceiling fan circling above me, moths flying around a yellow light, and the stern faces of a familiar-looking bearded man and a pretty girl, her blond hair curled like a princess's.**

"Do I see a potential romance here?" Nathan asked. Did he really have to ask that?

"I have no idea, thought it could be," Jaycee told him.

**They both looked down at me, and the girl said, "He's the one. He must be."**

"**Silence, Annabeth," the man said. "He's still conscious. Bring him inside."**

"That's the end of the chapter," Nathan said.

That was the last straw. The tears that were once threaten to come, were coming. I quickly ran out the cabin, getting weird glances from the others. I ignored the glances and went to find Chiron. We needed to talk.

Narrator

The other campers watched "Sami" run out of the cabin.

"Why did she just run out?" Shay asked.

"I don't even know," Dylan confessed. "What should we do?"

"Let's follow her and see what is wrong," Ray said, jumping up and walking out the cabin. The others had no choice but to follow. Running to the Big House, they saw "Sami" and Chiron talking. "Sami" had tears in her eyes but none of the campers knew why. They quickly hide by the bushes, trying really hard not to be seen.

"Why did no one tell me she died?" Sami yell/asked Chiron. Chiron looked at her with a look of sympathy.

"She ended up living though," Chiron told her softly.

"I know that but hearing it, years after she really died, made me frustrated, sad, and confused all at the same time. It is even harder hearing the story when I never knew it _and _was about my best friends when they are dead."

"I understand Thalia." The campers looked at each other, mouthing _'Thalia?' _They all hear that name once before but it was the name of the tree. Why is she being called Thalia, after the pine tree?

"I know you probably do Chiron, but I need to know…"

"Need to know what?"

"If you think I can handle the rest of the story."

"I think can. I think you should probably tell the others the truth, but only part of it-your real name, your relationship with Percy, and how you are still alive." "Sami" nodded her head. She was about to go back to the cabin until the campers stood up.

"How much did you hear?" "Sami" asked.

"Just about everything," Shay told her. Chiron gave "Sami" a look, like tell them now.

"My real name is Thalia Grace," the ex- "Sami" said. "I knew Percy personal, since he is one of my best friends. I am the Lieutenant to the goddess Artemis, part of the Hunters of Artemis."

The campers looked at each other in shock. For some, their suspicions of her were confirmed. They knew she was really upset about Percy, but now they want more information about her.

Talia spoke up first. "Who is your godly parent?"

Before Thalia could answer, Chiron did. "All in good time Talia. Now I suggest you go back and read the rest of the book." They all nodded their heads, heading back to the Apollo cabin.

* * *

><p><strong>Good? Bad? REVIEW! <strong>

**Poll results (includes poll votes and review votes)**

**My Mother Teaches Me Bullfighting: 8 votes**

**My Dinner Goes Up In Smoke: 3 votes**

**Grover Unexpectedly Loses His Pants: 2 votes**

**I Play Pinochle With A Horse: 2 votes**

**I Become Supreme Lord of the Bathroom: 1 vote**

**I will try and update more often. Remeber to reveiw! Till next time.**

**~sciencelover**


	7. I Play Pinochle With A Horse

**Hey my readers! I am back for another update!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 7<p>

Thalia

We all nodded our heads and started to head back to the Apollo cabin when Chiron called me back.

"Now that they know Thalia, they might be asking who your parent is or what happens next. You should just tell them-"

"That's for me to know and for you to find out," I finished for him.

"I was going to say 'All in good time' but that works too." I chuckled at him, then heading back to the cabin. It was good to get the secret off my chest. The problem was, it will still be hard to hear about their adventures. When I entered the cabin, I sat right where I sat before, next to Jaycee.

"So what was Percy like?" Shay asked.

"Why don't we finish reading the books?" I suggested. "That way you can hear first hand about what he was like."

"But that's taking the hard way," he complained.

I shrugged my shoulders. "Though luck. Who is reading next?"

"I am," Dylan said, holding up the book. "So you _can't_ tell you about Percy? I mean, is he even alive today?"

I swallowed before answering, "Just read."

"**I Play Pinochle with a Horse**," Dylan read, chuckling.

**I had weird dreams full of barnyard animals. Most of them wanted to kill me. The rest wanted food. **

"On a scale of weirdness for demigod dreams, that is probably the weirdest," Cayden commented.

"That was just random," I said. "Even for Percy."

"So he is-" Ray started to say before I interrupted him.

"Not telling."

**I must've woken up several times, but what I heard and saw made no sense, so I just passed out again. I remember lying in a soft bed, being spoon-fed something that tasted like buttered popcorn, only it was pudding. The girl with curly blond hair hovered over me, smirking as she scraped drips off my chin with the spoon.**

"That must have boosted his confidence," Ella said.

"More like embarrassed," Nathan corrected. "I know I would have."

**When she saw my eyes open, she asked, "What will happen at the summer solstice?"**

"Oh like he would know," I huffed.

**I managed to croak, "What?"**

**She looked around, as if afraid someone would overhear. "What's going on? What was stolen? We've only got a few weeks!"**

"**I'm sorry," I mumbled, "I don't…"**

**Somebody knocked on the door, and the girl quickly filled my mouth with pudding.**

**The next time I woke up, the girl was gone.**

"Missing her already?" Jaycee asked.

**A husky blond dude, like a surfer, stood in the corner of the bedroom keeping watch over me. He had blue eyes- at least a dozen of them-on his cheeks, his forehead, the backs of his hands. **

"Argus was alive back then?" Ray asked.

"Apparently he _was_ alive back then," Talia answered.

"How long ago did this take place?" Dylan wondered. They looked at me but I just shook my head.

"Maybe I will tell you later."

**When I finally came around for good, there was nothing weird about my surroundings, except that they were nicer than I was used to. I was sitting in a deck chair on a huge porch, gazing across a meadow at green hills in the distance. The breeze smelled like strawberries.**

"I love that smell," Jaycee said, zoning out for a second.

**There was a blanket over my legs, a pillow behind my neck. All that was great, but my mouth felt like a scorpion had been using it for a nest. **

"And _how_ would he know that," Ella wondered.

"It is a strange comparison," I noted.

**My tongue was dry and nasty and every one of my teeth hurt.**

**On the table next to me was a tall drink. It looked like iced apple juice, with a green straw and a paper parasol stuck through a maraschino cherry.**

"Yummy, nectar," Nathan said dreamily.

"Unless you drink too much then you burn up," Talia reminded him.

**My hand was so weak I almost dropped the glass once I got my fingers around it.**

"**Careful," a familiar voice said.**

**Grover was leaning against the porch railing, looking like he hadn't slept in a week. Under one arm, he cradled a shoe box. He was wearing blue jeans, Converse hi-tops and a bright orange T-shirt that said CAMP HALF-BLOOD. Just plain old Grover. Not the goat boy.**

"Do you think Grover would like being called goat boy?" Ray asked.

"He didn't like being called a donkey so I guess he will have the same reaction," I guessed.

**So maybe I'd had a nightmare. Maybe my mom was okay. **

"Hopefully she is," Ella whispered.

**We were still on vacation, and we'd stopped here at this big house for some reason. And…**

"**You saved my life," Grover said. "I…well, the least I could do…I went back to the hill. I thought you might want this."**

**Reverently, he placed the shoe box in my lap.**

**Inside was a black-and-white bull's horn,**

"His spoil of war," Cayden said.

**the base jagged from being broken off, the tip splattered with dried blood.**

**It hadn't been a nightmare.**

"**The Minotaur," I said.**

"Not the best idea," Dylan said.

"**Um, Percy, it isn't a good idea-"**

"Looks like you and Grover think alike," Nathan told him, chuckling.

"I was just saying it wasn't a good idea," Dylan defended himself.

"So you don't want to be like my best friend?" I teased him.

"No…yes…I don't know…just, oh look what you started!" He shouted at Nathan, who was laughing at him.

"**That's what they call him in the Greek myths, isn't it?" I demanded. "The Minotaur. Half man, half bull."**

**Grover shifted uncomfortably. "You've been out for two days. How much do you remember?"**

"**My mom. Is she really…"**

**He looked down. **

"Is she really dead?" Jaycee asked, looking at me, as well as everyone else. "I mean, right now in the book."

"I honestly don't know," I said. I mean, I know she drove us to the school, but I still don't understand. If she did die, how did she come back? Unless Percy went to the Underworld…which, knowing him, he probably did.

**I stared across the meadow. There were groves of trees, a winding stream, acres of strawberries spread out under the blue sky. The valley was surrounded by rolling hills, and the tallest one, directly in front of us, was the one with the huge pine tree on top. Even that looked beautiful in the sunlight.**

"Half-Blood and the pine tree that was called Thalia," Shay said. "Are you named after a pine tree?" He directed the last part towards me. I couldn't help but laugh, neither could anyone else.

"That's for me to know and you to find out," I managed to say through my laughter.

**My mother was gone. The whole world should be black and cold. Nothing should look beautiful. **

"**I'm sorry," Grover sniffled. "I'm a failure. I'm-I'm the worst satyr in the world."**

"Please don't say that Grover," I said. "That's not true."

"Why would he say that?" Talia demanded. I know why, but I didn't say that out loud.

**He moaned, stomping his foot so hard it came off. I mean, the Converse hi-top came off. The inside was filled with Styrofoam, expect for a hoof-shaped hole.**

"**Oh, Styx!" he mumbled.**

**Thunder rolled across the clear sky. **

"Zeus is always so dramatic," Shay noticed.

**As he struggled to get his hoof back in the fake foot, I thought, Well, that settles it.**

**Grover was a satyr. I was ready to bet that if I shaved his curly brown hair, I'd find tiny horns on his head. But I was too miserable to care that satyrs existed, or even minotaurs.**

"At least he finally accepted it," Ray mumbled.

"Let's hope he accepts the fate of his mom," Ella whispered.

**All that meant was my mom really had been squeezed into nothingness, dissolved into yellow light.**

**I was alone. An orphan. I would have to live with…Smelly Gabe? No. That would never happen. **

"Good," Talia said. "That guy was a jerk."

"He could just stay at camp all year long," Cayden suggested.

"He probably will."

**I would live on the streets first. I would pretend I was seventeen and join the army. I'd do something.**

**Grover was still sniffling. The poor kid-poor goat, satyr, whatever-looked as if he expected to be hit.**

**I said, "It wasn't your fault."**

"**Yes, it was. I was supposed to _protect_ you."**

"**Did my mother ask you to protect me?"**

"**No. But that's my job. I'm a keeper. At least…I was."**

"Maybe he'll get a second chance," Jaycee hoped. _I am afraid that was his second chance. _

"**But why…" I suddenly felt dizzy, my vision swimming.**

"**Don't strain yourself," Grover said. "Here." **

**He helped me hold my glass and put the straw to my lips.**

**I recoiled at the taste,**

"Why would he?" Ray wondered. "I love nectar, if it doesn't burn my insides of course."

**because I was expecting apple juice. It wasn't that at all. It was chocolate-chip cookies. Liquid cookies. And not just any cookies-my mom's homemade blue chocolate-chip cookies, buttery and hot, with the chips still melting. Drinking it, my whole body felt warm and good, full of energy. My grief didn't go away, but I felt as if my mom had just brushed her hand against my cheek, given me a cookie the way she used to when I was small, and told me everything was going to be okay.**

"He probably doesn't think it will be okay though," I commented over the other girls going 'Awww'.

**Before I knew it, I'd drained the glass. I stared into it, sure I'd just had a warm drink, but the ice cubes hadn't even melted. **

"Magic, magic, magic," Shay said, trying to sound all mysterious.

"That could be it," Talia admitted.

"**Was it good?" Grover asked. **

**I nodded.**

"**What did it taste like?" He sounded so wistful, I felt guilty. **

"Don't be," Nathan claimed. "He could have burned up."

"And we don't want that," I added.

"**Sorry," I said. "I should've let you taste."**

**His eyes got wide. "No! That's not what I meant. I just…wondered." **

"**Chocolate-chip cookies," I said. "My mom's. Homemade."**

**He sighed. "And how do you feel?"**

"**Like I could throw Nancy Bobofit a hundred yards."**

"**That's good," he said. **

"No, that's _extremely _good," Cayden corrected. "That girl is just plain mean."

Dylan nodded. "I think he _should_ throw her a hundred yards. No, wait; it should be a thousand yards.

"If he only could throw that far," I reminded him.

**I don't think you could risk drinking any more of that stuff."**

"**What do you mean?"**

**He took the empty glass from me gingerly, as if it were dynamite, **

"It could be for him," Ella said.

**and set it back on the table. "Come on. Chiron and Mr. D are waiting."**

**The porch wrapped all the way around the farmhouse.**

**My legs felt wobbly, trying to walk that far. Grover offered to carry the Minotaur horn, but I held on to it. I paid for that souvenir the hard way. I wasn't going to let it go.**

**As we came around the opposite end of the house, I caught my breath.**

"It is pretty amazing," Jaycee admitted.

Shay nodded his head in agreement. "I was like that too."

**We must've been on the north shore of Long Island,**

"You are right about that," Ray said.

**because on this side of the house, the valley marched all the way up to the water, which glittered about a mile in the distance. Between here and there, I simply couldn't process everything I was seeing. The landscape was dotted with buildings that looked like ancient Greek architecture-an open-air pavilion, am amphitheater, a circular arena-expect that they all looked brand new, their white marble columns sparkling in the sun. In a nearby sandpit, a dozen high school-age kids and satyrs played volleyball. Canoes glided across a small lake. Kids in bright orange T-shirts like Grover's were chasing each other around a cluster of cabins nestled in the woods. Some shot targets at an archery range. Others rode horses down a wooded trail, and, unless I was hallucinating, some of their horses had wings.**

"No," Nathan said. "They actually do have wings."

"You do know you are talking to a book right?" I asked him.

"Who cares?"

"Just making sure you knew Nathan."

**Down at the end of the porch, two men sat across from each other at a card table. The blond-haired girl who'd spoon-fed me popcorn-flavored pudding was leaning on the porch rail next to them. **

"I think he was happy about that," Ella announced.

"I think you could be right," Jaycee smirked.

**The man facing me was small, but porky. He had a red nose, big watery eyes, and curly hair so black it was almost purple. He looked like those paintings of baby angles-what do you call them, hubbubs? No, cherubs. That's it. He looked like a cherub who'd turned middle-aged in a trailer park.**

We all burst out laughing. I bet Dionysus would _love_ to hear that.

**He wore a tiger-pattern Hawaiian shirt, and he would've fit right in at one of Gabe's poker parties, except I got the feeling this guy could've out-gambled even my stepfather.**

"I bet he could," Dylan admitted, even though he looked like he didn't want to.

"But if he didn't, he would probably blast him to ashes" Talia mentioned.

"So it's a win," Shay clarified. "Well for everyone who knows Gabe."

"**That's Mr. D," Grover murmured to me. "He's the camp director.**

"Mr. D is the camp director?" Ray shook his head at that thought. "That must have been torture."

"It kind of was," I told him.

"Why is he even the camp director," Cayden asked. "Mr. D only comes to camp now a day when he wants to play pinochle with Chiron. Wait, how old are you?"

"I wouldn't tell and I bet it will be explained."

**Be polite. The girl, that's Annabeth Chase. She's just a camper, but she's been here longer than just about anybody. And you already know Chiron…"**

**He pointed at the guy whose back was to me.**

**First, I realized he was sitting in the wheelchair. Than I recognized the tweed jacket, the thinning brown hair, the scraggly beard.**

"**Mr. Brunner!" I cried. **

"Why is Mr. Brunner at camp?" Dylan wondered.

"Idiot, Chiron is Mr. Brunner," Jaycee told him.

**The Latin teacher turned and smiled at me. His eyes had that mischievous glint they sometimes got in glass when he pulled a pop quiz and made all the multiple choice answers _B_. **

"I wish all test and quizzes were like that," Shay said.

"Don't we all?" Nathan told him. I rolled my eyes at them.

"**Ah, good, Percy," he said. "Now we have four for pinochle."**

**He offered me a chair to the right of Mr. D, who looked at me with bloodshot eyes and heaved a great sigh. "Oh, I suppose I must say it. Welcome to Camp Half-Blood. There. Now, don't expect me to be glad to see you."  
><strong>

"Rude much," I huffed.

"**Uh, thanks." I scooted a little farther away from him because, if there was one thing I had learned from living with Gabe, it was how to tell when an adult has been hitting the happy juice. If Mr. D was a stranger to alcohol, I was a satyr.**

"Sorry to tell you Percy but you're a satyr," Ray smirked.

"**Annabeth?" Mr. Brunner called to the blond girl.**

**She came forward and Mr. Brunner introduced us. "This young lady nursed you back to health, Percy. Annabeth, my dear, why don't you go check on Percy's bunk? We'll be putting him in cabin eleven for now."**

**Annabeth said, "Sure, Chiron."**

**She was probably my age, maybe a couple inches taller, and a whole lot more athletic looking. With her deep tan and her curly blond hair, she was almost exactly what I thought a stereotypical California girl would look like, except her eyes ruined the image. They were startling gray, like storm clouds; pretty, but intimidating, too, as if she were analyzing the best way to take me down in a fight.**

"With those characteristics, I bet Annabeth is a daughter of Athena," Talia thought, looking towards me to clarify.

"You could be right, or you could be wrong."

**She glanced at the minotaur horn in my hands, than back at me. I imagined she was going to say, _You killed the minotaur! _or _Wow, you're so awesome! _or something like that.**

"Annabeth wouldn't say that," I mumbled.

**Instead she said, "You drool when you sleep."**

Everyone burst out laughing.

"He just got burned," Shay said through his laughter.

**Then she sprinted off down the lawn, her blond hair flying behind her.**

"**So," I said, anxious to change the subject. "You, uh, work here, Mr. Brunner?"**

"**Not Mr. Brunner," the ex-Mr. Brunner said. "I'm afraid that was a pseudonym. You may call me Chiron."**

"Why do teachers always use long words like 'pseudonym'?" Nathan asked.

"To make you learn," Jaycee told him.

"But that's too hard."

"**Okay." Totally confused, I looked at the director. "And Mr. D…does that stand for something?"**

**Mr. D stopped shuffling the cards. He looked at me like I'd just belched loudly.**

The boys all chuckled at that.

"**Young man, names are powerful things. You don't just go around using them for no reason."**

"Or Willy Nellie," Shay said. "Chiron told me it that way."

"Of course he did," Ella told him.

"**Oh. Right. Sorry."**

"**I must say, Percy," Chiron-Brunner broke in, "I'm glad to see you alive. It's been a long time since I've made a house call to a potential camper. I'd hate to think I've wasted my time."**

"That's such a moral buster," I said, sarcastically.

"**House call?"**

"**My year at Yancy Academy, to instruct you. We have satyrs at most schools, of course, keeping a lookout. But Grover alerted me as soon as he met you. He sensed you were something special, so I decided to come upstate. I convinced the other Latin teacher to…ah, take a leave of absence."**

**I tried to remember the beginning of the school year. It seemed like so long ago, but I did have a fuzzy memory of there being another Latin teacher my first week at Yancy. Then, without explanation, he had disappeared and Mr. Brunner had taken the class.**

"The Mist sure does work wonders," Jaycee said.

"Yea wonders to get you killed by monsters in disguise!" Nathan yelled at her.

"But you usually do kill the monsters," Cayden reminded him.

"Some people don't though."

"**You came to Yancy to teach me?" I asked.**

**Chiron nodded. "Honestly, I wasn't sure about you at first.**

"That must have made his insides feel warm and fuzzy," Ella mumbled.

**We contacted your mother, let her know we were keeping an eye on you in case you were ready for Camp Half-Blood. But you still had so much to learn. Nevertheless, you made it here alive, and that's always the first test."**

"And sadly, some don't pass the first test," Shay stated.

"**Grover," Mr. D said impatiently, "are you playing or not?"**

"**Yes, sir!" Grover trembled as he took the fourth chair, though I didn't know why he should be so afraid of a pudgy little man in a tiger-print Hawaiian shirt.**

"Mr. D would not like to hear that," Talia blurted out.

"Why would I expect for him to say something to tick him off?" Ray asked.

"Because, knowing him, he probably will," I told him.

"**You _do_ know how to play pinochle?" Mr. D eyed me suspiciously.**

"**I'm afraid not," I said.**

"**I'm afraid not,_ sir_," he said.**

"**Sir," I repeated. I was liking the camp director less and less.**

"At one point, everyone does," Cayden grumbled.

"**Well," he told me, "it is, along with gladiator fighting and Pac-Man, one of the greatest games ever invented by humans. I would expect all _civilized _young men to know the rules." **

Most of the boys were laughing at the end of that paragraph. I couldn't help but smirk at Mr. D's obsession with Pac-Man.

"He loves his Pac-Man," Jaycee noted.

"More like an obsession," I corrected.

"**I'm sure the boy can learn," Chiron said.**

"**Please," I said, "what is this place? What am I doing here? Mr. Brun-Chiron-why would you go to Yancy Academy just to teach me?"**

**Mr. D snorted. "I asked the same question."**

**The camp director dealt the cards. Grover flinched every time one landed in his pile.**

"It's just a card," Cayden whispered. "Don't be afraid."

**Chiron smiled at me sympathetically, the way he used to in Latin class, as if to let me know that no matter what my average was, _I _was his star student. He expected _me_ to have the right answer.**

"I would hate that," Dylan said. "Mostly because I would never remember half of things that the teacher taught us."

"I was once," Ella informed us. "It was okay."

"**Percy," he said. "Did your mother tell you nothing?"**

"**See said…" I remembered her sad eyes, looking out over the sea. "She told me she was afraid to send me here, even though my father had wanted her to. She said that once I was here, I probably couldn't leave. She wanted to keep me close to her."**

"**Typical," Mr. D said. "That's how they usually get killed. Young man, are you bidding or not?"**

"He is always so positive," Nathan said sarcastically.

"And he has a way of changing the subject," I added.

**He explained, impatiently,**

"Of course he was," Shay muttered.

**how you bid in pinochle, and so I did.**

"I like how he explains it so simply," Talia noted.

"**I'm afraid there's too much to tell," Chiron said. "I'm afraid our usual orientation film won't be sufficient."**

"**Orientation film?" I asked.**

"That's exactly what I said when I heard that," Nathan said.

"It was boring," Jaycee mumbled. "I saw turtles more interesting."

"Not be miss grumpy pants," Dylan told her.

"I am not!"

"**No," Chiron decided. "Well, Percy. You know you friend Grover is a satyr. You know"-he pointed to the horn in the shoe box-"that you have killed the Minotaur. No small feat, either, lad. What you may not know is that great powers are at work in your life. Gods-the forces you call the Greek gods-are very much alive."**

**I stared at the others around the table. **

**I waited for somebody to yell, _Not! _But all I got was Mr. D yelling, "Oh, a royal marriage. Trick! Trick!" He cackled as he tallied up his points.**

"To some people, that may have not been relief," Ella said.

"Or to some people, very funny," Ray corrected.

"**Mr. D," Grover asked timidly, "if you're not going to eat it, could I have you Diet Coke can?"**

Several people chuckled at his antics. I rolled my eyes knowing Grover would do something like that.

"**Eh? Oh, all right."**

**Grover bit a huge shard out of the empty aluminum can and chewed it mournfully.**

"I always wondered how that doesn't how that doesn't tear up their insides," Cayden admitted.

"Maybe their insides our different then ours," I suggested.

"**Wait," I told Chiron. "You're telling me there's such a thing as God."**

"**Well, now," Chiron said. "Good-capital _G_, God. That's a different matter altogether. We shan't deal with the metaphysical."**

"**Metaphysical? But you were talking about-"**

"**Ah, gods, plural, as in, great beings that control the forces of nature and human endeavors: the immortal gods of Olympus. That's a smaller matter."**

"I don't think the gods would like that," Jaycee said.

"I am surprise he wasn't blasted yet," Nathan admitted.

"**Smaller?"**

"**Yes, quite. The gods we discussed in Latin class."  
><strong>

"**Zeus," I said. "Hera. Apollo. You mean them."**

**And there it was again-distant thunder on a cloudless day.**

"Maybe because you were throwing names around," Ray suggested.

"Or Zeus just likes to make thunder," Cayden said.

"Or not," Talia told him.

"**Young man, said Mr. D, "I would really be less casual about throwing those names around, if I were you."**

"**But they're stories," I said. "They're-myths, to explain lightning and the seasons and stuff. They're what people believed before there was science."**

"Not the smartest move Percy," I said.

"Now he will get chewed out for that," Shay added.

"**Science!" Mr. D scoffed. "And tell me, Perseus Jackson"-**

"Perseus," Dylan chuckled. "I wouldn't expect that as his full name."

"Also since Perseus was a son of Zeus," Ella reminded him.

**I flinched when he said my real name, which I never told anybody-"what will people think of your 'science' two thousands years from now?" Mr. D continued. "Hmm? They will call it primitive mumbo jumbo. That's what. Oh, I love mortals-they have absolutely no sense of perspective. They think they've come _so-o-o_ far. And have they, Chiron? Look at this boy and tell me."**

**I wasn't liking Mr. D much, but there was something about the way he called me mortal, as if…he wasn't.**

"And he finally gets part of the picture," I said.

"Now he needs to figure out the rest," Talia continued.

**It was enough to put a lump in my throat, to suggest why Grover was dutifully minding his cards, chewing his soda can, and keeping his mouth shut.**

"**Percy," Chiron said, "you may choose to believe or not, but the fact is that immortal means immortal. Can you imagine that for a moment, never dying? Never fading? Existing, just as you are for all time?"**

**I was about to answer, off the top of my head, that it sounded like a pretty good deal,**

_So he did want to be immortal, at one point. _

**but the tone of Chiron's voice made me hesitate.**

"**You mean, whether people believed in you or not?" I said.**

"**Exactly," Chiron agreed. "If you were a god, how would you like being called a myth, and old story to explain lighting? What if I told you, Perseus Jackson, that someday people would call _you _myth, just created to explain how little boys can get over losing their mothers?"**

"That was harsh," Talia noted.

"It does make being immortal sound very bad," Ray sighed. "It makes me rethink about being immortal."

"Keep dreaming about becoming immortal," Jaycee told him.

"Don't worry, I am."

**My heart pounded. He was trying to make me angry for some reason, but I wasn't going to let him. I said, "I wouldn't like it. But I don't believe in gods."**

"I bet Mr. D would like hearing that," Shay said.

"**Oh, you'd better," Mr. D murmured. "Before one of them incinerates you."**

**Grover said, "P-please, sir. He's just lost his mother. He's in shock."**

"At least Grover is trying to keep him from becoming a pile of ashes," Dylan commented.

"It could have made him madder," Ella admitted.

"**A lucky thing, too," Mr. D grumbled, playing a card. "Bad enough I'm confined to this miserable job, working with boys who don't even believe!"**

**He waved his hand and a goblet appeared on the table, as if the sunlight had bent, momentarily, and woven the air into glass. The goblet filled itself with red wine.**

**My jaw dropped, but Chiron hardly looked up.**

"**Mr. D," he warned, "your restrictions."**

"Halleluiah!" Nathan screamed. "No more alcohol for Mr. D."

"That would be good for all of us if that happened today," Jaycee told him. "But he still drinks alcohol today."

**Mr. D looked at the wine and feigned surprise.**

"**Dear me." He looked at the sky and yelled, "Old habits! Sorry!"**

**More thunder.**

"There is always thunder," Cayden grumbled.

**Mr. D waved his hand again, and the wineglass changed into a fresh can of Diet Coke. He sighed unhappily, popped the top of the soda, and went back to his card game.**

"He doesn't like Diet Coke?" Shay asked. "I love Diet Coke."

"I prefer apple cider," Nathan said.

"Oh, we all know that," I told him.

**Chiron winked at me. "Mr. D offended his father a while back, took a fancy to a wood nymph who had been declared off-limits."**

"**A wood nymph," I repeated, still staring at the Diet Coke can like it was from outer space.**

"If only it did," Nathan admitted.

"**Yes," Mr. D confessed. "Father loves to punish me. The first time, Prohibition. Ghastly!" Absolutely horrid ten years! The second time-well, she really was pretty, and I couldn't stay away-**

"Mr. D is a player," Ray gasped.

"That is repulsive," Talia said.

**the second time, he sent me here. Half-Blood Hill. Summer camp for brats like you. 'Be a better influence,' he told me. 'Work with youths rather than tearing them down.' Ha! Absolutely unfair."**

**Mr. D sounded about six years old, like a pouting little kid.**

"He did described Mr. D pretty well," Ella noticed.

"**And…" I stammered, "your father is…"**

"**_Di immortals_, Chiron," Mr. D said. "I thought you taught this boy the basics. My father is Zeus, of course."**

**I ran through D names from Greek mythology. Wine. The skin of a tiger. The satyrs that seemed to work here. The way Grover cringed, as if Mr. D were his master.**

"**You're Dionysus," I said. "The god of wine."**

"It took him long enough," I huffed.

"I wonder if he actually thought that," Dylan wondered.

**Mr. D rolled his eyes. "What do they say, these days, Grover? Do the children say, 'Well, duh!'?"**

"**Y-yes, Mr. D."**

"We still that today," Cayden said. "How long ago did this take place?"

I ignored him, but everyone was looking at me, thinking I would tell them. Maybe when we finish the book, I might.

"**Then, well, duh! Percy Jackson. Did you think I was Aphrodite, perhaps?" **

Many people chuckled at his strange humor.

"**You're a god."**

"Yes, child."

"**A god. You."**

"The worst thing he could have done," Talia said.

**He turned to look at me straight on, and I saw a kind of purplish fire in his eyes, a hint that this whiny, plump little man was only showing me the tiniest bit of his true nature. I saw visions of grape vines choking unbelievers to death, drunken warriors insane with battle lust, sailors screaming as their hands turned to flippers, their faces elongating into dolphin snouts. I knew that if I pushed him, Mr. D would show me worse things. He would plant a disease in my brain that would leave me wearing a straitjacket in a rubber room for the rest of my life.**

All of us sat there in shock after hearing what a god could do.

"I now know never to anger Mr. D," Shay whispered.

"You never want to anger a god in general," Jaycee mumbled.

"**Would you like to test me, child?" he said quietly.**

"**No. No, sir."**

"Smart move," I commented.

**The fire died a little. He turned back to his card game. "I believe I win."**

"**Not quite, Mr. D," Chiron said. He set down a straight, tallied the points, and said, "The game goes to me."**

**I thought Mr. D was going to vaporize Chiron right out of his wheelchair, but he just sighed through his nose, as if he were used to being beaten by the Latin teacher.**

"Pretty much everyday," Dylan said.

"That must suck," Cayden whispered.

**He got up, and Grover rose, too.**

"**I'm tired," Mr. D said. "I believe I'll take a nap before the sing-along tonight. But first, Grover, we need to talk, _again,_ about your less-than-perfect performance on this assignment."**

**Grover's face beaded with sweat. "Y-yes, sir."**

**Mr. D turned to me. "Cabin eleven, Percy Jackson. And mind your manners."**

"I highly doubt he will," I mumbled.

"It wouldn't be funny if he didn't," Nathan said.

**He swept into the farmhouse, Grover following miserably.**

"**Will Grover be okay?" I asked Chiron.**

**Chiron nodded, though he looked a bit troubled. "Old Dionysus isn't really mad. He just hates his job. He's been…ah, grounded, I guess you would say, and he can't stand waiting another century before he's allowed to go back to Olympus."**

"I would hate wanting a century to go back to Olympus," Ray grumbled.

"Anyone would," Jaycee told him.

"**Mount Olympus," I said. "You're telling me there really is a palace there?"**

"**Well now, there's Mount Olympus in Greece. And then there's the home of the gods, the convergence point of their powers, which did indeed used to be on Mount Olympus. It's still called Mount Olympus, out of respect to the old ways, but the palace moves, Percy, just as the gods do."**

"**You mean the Greek gods are here? Like…in _America_?"**

"**Well, certainly. The gods move with the heart of the West."**

"**The what?"**

"Don't worry Percy," Shay said. "I was confused about that too."

"You are always confused," Talia told him.

"So? That is just me."

"That is you just being weird."

"**Come now, Percy. What you call 'Western civilization.' Do you think it's just an abstract concept? No, it's a living force. A collective consciousness that has burned bright for thousands of years. The gods are part of it. You might even say they are the source of it, or at least, they are tied so tightly to it that they couldn't possibly fade, no unless all of Western civilization were obliterated. The fire started in Greece. Then, as you well know-or as I hope you know, since you passed my course-the heart of the fire moved to Rome, and so did the gods. Oh, different names, perhaps- Jupiter for Zeus, Venus for Aphrodite, and so on- but the same forces, the same gods."**

"**And then they died."**

"Nope," Ella said. "Or else, we all wouldn't be here."

"**Died? No. Did the west die? The gods simply moved, to Germany, to France, to Spain, for a while.**

"Spain is a very nice place," Jaycee said. "My dad took me there over the summer."

"Nice to know," Dylan muttered.

**Wherever the flame was brightest, the gods were there. They spent several centuries in England. All you need to do is look at the architecture. People do not forget the gods. Every place they've ruled, for the last three thousand years, you can see them in paintings, in statues, on the most important buildings. And yes, Percy, of course they are now in your United States.**

"He says it like Percy owns the United States," Nathan noticed.

**Look at your symbol, the eagle of Zeus. Look at the statue of Prometheus in Rockefeller Center, the Greek facades of your government buildings in Washington. I defy you to find any American city where the Olympians are not prominently displayed in multiple places. Like it or not- and believe me, plenty of people weren't very fond of Rome, either-**

"And neither were we," Ray mumbled.

"Though we see them twice a month for war games," Talia said.

**America is now the heart of the flame. It is the great power of the West. And so Olympus is here. And we are here."**

**It was all too much, especially the fact that _I_ seemed to be included in Chiron's _we_, as if I were part of some club.**

"Because we kind of are," Shay admitted.

"And sometimes the people included are trouble makers," I added, thinking of the Stoll brothers and their childish pranks.

"**Who are you, Chiron? Who…who am I?"**

**Chiron smiled. He shifted his weight as if he were going to get up out of his wheelchair, but I knew that was impossible. He was paralyzed from the waist down. **

"**Who are you?" he mused. "Well, that's the question we all want answered, isn't it? But for now, we should get you a bunk in cabin eleven. There will be new friends to meet.**

"And to meet knew enemies," Cayden added.

"It isn't camp without enemies," Shay said.

"Or crazy people who want to run you through with a sword," Jaycee claimed. We all started at her, till Dylan started to read again.

**And plenty of time for lessons tomorrow. Besides, there will be s'mores at the campfire tonight, and I simply adore chocolate."**

"He is obsessed with chocolate," Ella chuckled.

**And then he did rise form his wheelchair. But there was something odd about the way he did it. His blanket fell away from his legs, but the legs didn't move. His waist kept getting longer, rising above his belt. At first, I thought he was wearing very long, white velvet underwear,**

We all chuckled at that.

"Does he have a thing for underwear?" Dylan asked. Many of us shook our heads, also wondering why he would refer to underwear.

**but as he kept rising out of the chair, taller than any man, I realized that the velvet underwear wasn't underwear; it was the front of an animal, muscle and sinew under coarse white fur. And the wheelchair wasn't a chair. It was some kind of container, an enormous box on wheels, and it must've been magic, because there's no way it could've held all of him.**

Wow, Percy. You made some good connections.

**A leg came out, long and knobby-kneed, with a huge polished hoof. Then another front let, then hindquarters, and then the box was empty, nothing but a metal shell with a couple of fake human legs attached.**

**I stared at the horse who had just sprung from the wheelchair: a huge white stallion. But where its neck should be was the upper body of my Latin teacher, smoothly grafted to the horse's trunk.**

"**What a relief," the centaur said. "I'd been cooped up in there so long, my fetlocks had fallen asleep. Now, come, Percy Jackson. Let's meet the other campers."**

"That is the end of the chapter," Dylan said, tossing the book to Jaycee.

* * *

><p><strong>Thank you reading! I will try to update this every week, 2 at the most. Most likly the update will be on either Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. Now click the little blue review button and reveiw!<strong>

**~sciencelover**


	8. I Become Supreme Lord of the Bathroom

**So sorry for not updating sooner. But here it is.**

**Disclaimer- If I really owned PJO, would I be on this website? No I wouldn't be. :-( *sad face***

* * *

><p>Chapter 8<p>

Thalia

"**I Become Supreme Lord of the Bathroom**," Jaycee read, earning chuckles from everyone.

"The chapter names keeps getting weirder and weirder," Shay noticed.

**Once I got over the fact that my Latin teacher was a horse, we had a nice tour, though I was careful no to walk behind him. I'd done pooper-scooper patrol in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade a few times, and, I'm sorry, I did not trust Chiron's back end the way I trusted his front.**

"I am pretty sure he can control himself," Dylan chuckled.

"If not, good luck," Shay added.

**We passed the volleyball pit. Several of the campers nudged each other. One pointed to the minotaur horn I was carrying. Another said, "That's _him_."**

"Now he will have a big ego," I mumbled.

**Most of the campers were older than me. Their satyr friends were bigger than Grover, all of them trotting around in orange CAMP HALF-BLOOD T-shirts, with nothing else to cover their bare shaggy hindquarters.**

"It really can be disturbing when they do that," Ray stated.

Several people nodded in agreement to that.

"But you get used to it after a few days," Jaycee added.

**I wasn't normally shy, but the way they stared at me made me uncomfortable. I felt like they were expecting me to do a flip or something.**

The boys started chanting 'Do it, do it!'

**I looked back at the farmhouse. It was a lot bigger than I'd realized-four stories tall, sky blue with white trim, like an upscale seaside resort. **

"I don't know if you noticed, but he has been referring to many sea references," Talia told us.

"Maybe he has a clue to who his godly parent is," Jaycee suggested.

"Or he is just a freak about water!" Cayden said.

**I was checking out the brass eagle weather vane on top when something caught my eye, a shadow in the uppermost window of the attic gable. Something had moved the curtain, just for a second, and I got the distinct impression I was being watched.**

"**What's up there?" I asked Chiron.**

**He looked where I was pointing, and his smile faded. "Just the attic."**

"**Somebody lives there?"**

"**No," he said with finality. "Not a single living thing."**

"No," Shay said. "That's because nobody lives in the attic."

"Just dusty old souvenirs," Dylan added.

"Those are important!" Jaycee snapped at him.

"Not really."

**I got the feeling he was being truthful. But I was also sure something had moved that curtain.**

"**Come along, Percy," Chiron said, his lighthearted tone now a little forced. "Lots to see."**

**We walked through the strawberry fields, where campers were picking bushels of berries while a satyr played a tune on a reed pipe. **

"I love our strawberries," Ella said. "They are bigger then most farmers."

"Thank you for that useless piece of information," Ray grumbled. He winced when she punched him in the stomach.

**Chiron told me the camp grew a nice crop for export to New York restaurants and Mount Olympus. **

"Already know that," Nathan muttered.

"**It pays our expenses," he explained. "And the strawberries take almost no effort."**

**He said Mr. D had this effect on fruit-bearing plants: they just went crazy when he was around. It worked best with wine grapes, but Mr. D was restricted from growing those, so they grew strawberries instead.**

"Good thing we do," Talia said. "If we grew wine grapes, Mr. D would be little crazier then we would like."

Dylan grimaced. "That was not a pretty picture."

**I watched the satyr playing his pipe. His music was causing lines of bugs to leave the strawberry patch in every direction, like refugees fleeing a fire. I wondered if Grover could work that kind of magic with music.**

_He can, probably not at the time but by the war against the Titans. _

**I wondered if he was still inside the farmhouse, getting chewed out by Mr. D.**

"**Grover won't get in too much trouble, will he?" I asked Chiron. "I mean…he was a good protector. Really."**

**Chiron sighed. He shed his tweed jacket and draped it over his horse's back like a saddle. "Grover has big dreams, Percy. Perhaps bigger than are reasonable. To reach his goal, he must first demonstrate great courage by succeeding as a keeper, finding a new camper and bringing him safely to Half-Blood Hill."**

"**But he did that!"**

"Not really," Cayden mumbled. "He was unconscious when you dragged him over the property line."

"He still brought him to Camp Half-Blood," I argued.

"Not really since he was unconscious."

"I still disagree."

"**I might agree with you," Chiron said.**

"Knew it," I told Cayden.

"**But it is not my place to judge. Dionysus and the Council of Cloven Elders must decide. I'm afraid they might not see this assignment as a success. After all, Grover lost you in New York. Then there's the unfortunate…ah…fate of your mother. And the fact that Grover was unconscious when you dragged him over the property line.**

"And I take the win!" Cayden smirked at me.

I shook my head. "In my mind, and in reality, _I_ won."

**The council might question whether this shows any courage on Grover's part."**

**I wanted to protest. None of what happened was Grover's fault. I also felt really, really guilty. If I hadn't given Grover the slip at the bus station, he might not have gotten in trouble.**

I frowned at that. "Don't think like that."

"It _was_ his fault, in a way," Dylan said.

"**He'll get a second chance, won't he?"**

**Chiron winced. "I'm afraid that _was_ Grover's second chance, Percy.**

The other campers looked confused.

"Second chance?" Jaycee asked. "I wonder what happened the first time."

**The council was not anxious to give him another, either, after what happened the first time, five years ago. Olympus knows, I advised him to wait longer before trying again. He's still so small for his age…"**

"**How old is he?"**

"**Oh, twenty-eight."**

"**What! And he's in sixth grade?"**

"That is how I would have responded," Nathan said.

"And you did just that when you learned how old Rob was," Ella reminded him.

"Rob?" I asked.

"Rob is a satyr that brought Nathan to camp."

"Which was not a good idea," Shay added, teasing Nathan who looked hurt.

"**Satyrs mature half as fast as humans, Percy. Grover has been the equivalent of a middle school student for the past six years."**

"That must suck!" Dylan said. "Imagine taking all those test and quizzes."

"But their lucky they can read English real easy," Jaycee added.

"**That's horrible."**

"**Quite," Chiron agreed. "At any rate, Grover is a later bloomer, even by satyr standards, and not yet very accomplished at woodland magic. Alas, he was anxious to pursue his dream.**

_And he did end up accomplishing his dream. _

**Perhaps now he will find** **some other career…"**

"**That's not fair," I said. "What happened the first time? Was it really bad?"**

**Chiron looked away quickly. "Let's move along, shall we?"**

Ray groaned. "I want to know what happened!"

_No you don't. You might become very confused, well, at least, I would have._

"Don't we all?" Talia muttered.

**But I wasn't quite ready to let the subject drop. Something had occurred to me when Chiron talked about my mother's fate, as if he were intentionally avoiding the word _death_.**

Remembering about Sally, they turned toward me.

"Is she really dead?" Jaycee asked.

"At that moment," I said, "I honestly have no idea. Knowing Percy, he might do something about it though."

**The beginnings of an idea-a tiny, hopeful fire- started forming in my mind.**

"**Chiron," I said. "If the gods and Olympus and all that are real…"**

"**Yes, child?"**

"**Does that mean the Underworld is real, too?"**

"Oh, don't you think about going there," Shay whispered. The others paled at the thought. Percy probably _did _go to the Underworld, maybe for quests or just with Nico.

**Chiron's expression darkened.**

"**Yes, child." He paused, as if choosing his words carefully. "There is a place where spirits go after death. But for now… until we know more… I would urge you to put that out of your mind."**

"Listen to Chiron Percy," Ella said. "It is better for you to listen to him."

"**What do you mean, 'until we know more'?"**

"**Come, Percy. Let's see the woods."**

"I bet he would _love_ that," Dylan muttered, sarcastically.

**As we got closer, I realized how huge the forest was. It took up at least a quarter of the valley, with trees so tall and thick, you could imagine nobody had been in there since the Native Americans.**

**Chiron said, "The woods are stocked, if you care to try your luck, but go armed."**

"**Stock with what?" I asked. "Armed with what?"**

"Stocked with various monsters," Ray said, trying to be helpful.

"Armed with a sword and armor," Shay added, grinning.

"No one asked," I told them, only to be ignored.

"**You'll see. Capture the flag is Friday night. Do you have your own sword and shield?"**

"Of course he doesn't Chiron," I said.

"**My own-?"**

"**No," Chiron said. "I don't suppose you do. I think a size five will do. I'll visit the armory later."**

**I wanted to ask what kind of summer camp had an armory, **

"Well, we kind of need it Percy," Dylan said.

"To help defend ourselves form monster," Jay added.

**but there was too much else to think about, so the tour continued. We saw the archery range, the canoeing lake, the stables (which Chiron didn't seem to like very much), the javelin range, the sing-along amphitheater, and the arena where Chiron said they held sword and spear fights.**

"**Sword and spear fights?" I asked.**

"**Cabin challenges and all that," he explained. "Not lethal. **

"Lethal?" Ray asked.

"It means causing death, deadly, or fatal," I explained.

"That sounds like fun," Cayden joked.

I shook my head. "For children of Ares, maybe it is."

"Why does it matter about who my father is?"

"I was just saying that since you are a son of Ares, you would enjoy being lethal."

"Not all the time."

"So you do-"

"Just shut up you guys!" Ella yelled.

**Usually.**

"Because of the Ares cabin," I said. Cayden just glared at me.

**Oh, yes, and there's the mess hall.**

**Chiron pointed to an outdoor pavilion framed in white Grecian columns on a hill overlooking the sea. There were a dozen stone picnic tables. No roof. No walls.**

"**What do you do when it rains?" I asked.**

"It doesn't rain," Dylan yelled, trying to be mysterious.

**Chiron looked at me as if I'd gone a little weird. "We still have to eat, don't we?" I decided to drop the subject.**

**Finally, he showed me the cabins. There were twelve of them,**

"Twelve?" they all asked/shouted in disbelief.

"But there are twenty-three cabins!" Nathan yelled. They all started shouting at once till they decided to ask me what was going.

"This was in the past," I explained to them. "Back then there were only twelve cabins, one for each of the Olympians."

"How long did this take place ago?" Talia asked.

"About 160 years ago." **(I will explain it at the end.)**

They all looked at me, some sadly (the girls), others confused (everyone).

"How are you still alive if you knew Percy?" Ray asked.

"I told you I was a Hunter of Artemis. Being a Hunter of Artemis means I am immortal, unless I break my vows or die in battle."

"So they are dead?" Shay asked.

"Yea," I said sadly. "Percy and Annabeth died when they were twenty-five, in an unexpected way. They died because of a house fire during the night, caused by_ empousa_ and a hellhound. Grover died and turned into a poppy flower after he was at a school, trying to protect a demigod from a hydra."

Jaycee gave me hug after hearing that. They all looked at me in sympathy.

"Do you want to continue?" Jaycee asked me.

I nodded. "I'll be fine. Continue please."

**nestled in the woods by the lake. They were arranged in a U, with two at the base and five in a row on either side. And they were without doubt the most bizarre collection of building I'd ever seen.**

"They really are," Shay agreed. "How did I get a cabin anyways?" Jaycee also nodded, wanting to know.

"It's a secret," I told them. They both looked disappointed. "It will be explained, later in the books. When we hear about certain campers, I might tell you how they died." They all nodded in agreement to that plan.

**Except for the fact that each had a large brass number above the door (odds on the left side, evens on the right), they looked absolutely nothing alike. Number nine smokestacks, like a tiny factory.**

Many laughed, probably thinking the same thing.

**Number four had tomato vines on the walls and a roof made out of real grass.**

Ella smiled at the mention of her cabin.

**Seven seemed to be made of solid gold, which gleamed so much in the sunlight it was almost impossible to look at. They all faced a commons area about the size of a soccer field, dotted with Greek statues, fountains, flower beds, and a couple of basketball hoops (which were more my speed). **

"Just like my half-brothers," Talia said.

**In the center of the field was a huge stone-lined firepit. Even though it was a warm afternoon, the hearth smoldered. A girl about nine years old was tending the flames, poking the coals with a stick.**

"Hestia," I whispered.

**The pair of cabins at the head of the field, numbers one and two,**

"Zeus and Hera," Dylan muttered.

"Not the best cabin to stay in," I grumbled. Thunder boomed in the background. "Oh you know it is true!"

They all looked at me strangely before Jaycee started to read again.

**Looked like his-and-hers mausoleums, big white marble boxes with heavy columns in the front. Cabin one was the biggest and bulkiest of the twelve. Its polished bronze doors shimmered like a hologram so that from different angles lightning bolts seemed to streak across them. Cabin two was more graceful somehow, with slimmer columns garlanded with pomegranates and flowers. The walls were carved with images of peacocks.**

"**Zeus and Hera?" I guessed.**

"Correct!" Dylan yelled, in a bad impression of a game show host.

"**Correct," Chiron said.**

"**Their cabins look empty."**

"**Several of the cabins are. That's true. No one ever stays in one or two."**

"I can understand not staying in two but why not one?" Ray wondered. "Right now there are three kids of Zeus right now."

The others agreed, but it was weird to hear I have new siblings. Hm, I wonder what they will think when they hear about the pack the Big Three made.

**Okay. So each cabin had a different god, like a mascot.**

I shook my head and chuckled while the others full out laughed.

"I love how he thinks," Cayden said, over the laughter.

**Twelve cabins for the twelve Olympians. But why would some be empty?**

**I stopped in front of the first cabin on the left, cabin three.**

**It wasn't high and mighty like cabin one, but long and low and solid. The outer walls were of rough gray stone studded with pieces of seashell and coral, as if the slabs had been hewn straight from the bottom of the ocean floor. I peeked inside the open doorway and Chiron said, "Oh, I wouldn't do that!"**

**Before he could pull me back, I caught the salty scent of the interior, like the wind on the shore at Montauk. The interior walls glowed like abalone. There were six empty bunk beds with silk sheets turned down. But there was no sign anyone had ever slept there.**

"Why wouldn't there be any kids of Poseidon?" Jaycee wondered.

The others looked as confused as her.

"And right now Poseidon has two kids, but they are only seven and eight," Nathan added.

"It just doesn't add up," Talia muttered, looking at me. I shook my head no, making that zipper across my lips.

**The place felt so sad and lonely, I was glad when Chiron put his hand on my shoulder and said, "Come along, Percy."**

"Don't worry Percy," Shay said, "I would have been glad too."

"It would make you feel so depressing," Ella agreed.

**Most of the other cabins were crowed with campers.**

"And many still are today," Ray snickered.

Dylan also chuckled. "The gods have been busy."

**Number five was bright red-**

Cayden pumped his fist in the air.

**a real nasty paint job, as if the color had been splashed on with buckets and fists.**

Cayden huffed at that. "It was not. The Ares cabin has the best paint job." Talia just grabbed his hand and squeezed it. When Cayden looked away, she mouthed the words _not really_. Many started to chuckle.

**The roof was lined with barbed wire. A stuffed wild boar's head hung over the doorway, and its eyes seemed to follow me. Inside I could see a bunch of mean-looking kids,**

"Not all of us are mean," Cayden grumbled.

**both girls and boys, arm wrestling and arguing with each other while rock music blared. The loudest was a girl maybe thirteen or fourteen. She wore a size XXXL CAMP HALFBLOOD T-shirt under a camouflage jacket. She zeroed in one me and gave me an evil sneer. She reminded me of Nancy Bobofit, though the camper girl was much bigger and tougher looking, and her hair was long and stringy, and brown instead of red.**

_And now enters Clarisse, the friend/enemy of Percy._

"That's your half-sister Cayden," Shay told him.

**I kept walking, trying to stay clear of Chiron's hooves. "We haven't seen any other centaurs," I observed.**

"**No," said Chiron sadly. "My kinsmen are a wild and barbaric folk, I'm afraid. You might encounter them in the wilderness, or at major sporting events.**

"The best baseball game ever," Shay and Dylan both said, sharing grins. The then started talking hot dogs and soda being thrown before Jaycee told them to shut up.

**But you won't see any here."**

"**You said your name was Chiron. Are you really…"**

"Yes Percy," I said, "he is _the_ Chiron."

**He smiled down at me. "_The _Chiron from the stories? Trainer of Hercules and all that? Yes, Percy, I am."**

"**But, shouldn't you be dead?"**

"No!" Ray shouted. "He shouldn't be dead. He didn't give a big punishment when I prank Ella's cabin."

"Which my siblings don't like," Ella told him.

"Oh who cares what they think?"

**Chiron paused, as if the question intrigued him. "I honestly don't know about _should _be. The truth is, I _can't _be dead. You see, eons ago the gods granted my wish. I could continue the work I loved. I could be a teacher of heroes as long as humanity needed me.**

"And we always will," Talia grinned.

"Forever and ever," Shay added, chuckling.

**I gained much from that wish…and I gave up much. But I'm still here, so I can only assume I'm still needed."**

**I though about being a teacher for three thousand years. It wouldn't have made my Top Ten Things to Wish For list.**

"Mine either," Cayden said.

Jaycee nodded. "Many people would agree but some people would want to be one."

"Maybe if it was something like gym, not something like math," Ray believed.

"Why math?" I asked him.

He only shrugged. "I always hated math, especially equations."

"**Doesn't it ever get boring?"**

"**No, no," he said. "Horribly depressing, at times, but never boring."**

"**Why depressing?"**

"_Di immortals_," I said. "Percy you are so dense."

**Chiron seemed to turn hard of hearing again.**

"**Oh, look," he said. "Annabeth is waiting for us."**

**The blond girl **

"They have been mentioning her name enough times but he still calls her blond girl." Dylan shook his head at the thought. "He really hasn't learned her name."

"He might soon," Jaycee told him.

"Or he might not."

**I'd met at the Big House was reading a book in front of the last cabin on the left, number eleven.**

Dylan and Ray both beamed at the mention of their cabin. Ray then realized something before asking, "Why is he going to the Hermes cabin? We somebody new comes, they get claimed right away."

"I don't know," I lied.

**When we reached her, she looked me over critically, like she was thinking about how much I drooled.**

Many chuckled while others full out laughed.

**I tried to see what she was reading, but I couldn't make out the title. I thought my dyslexia was acting up. Then I realized the title wasn't even English. The letters looked Greek to me. I mean, literally Greek.**

"Oh I wonder why?" Talia muttered.

Cayden shook his head. "That was a bad pun."

**There were pictures of temples and statues and different kinds of columns, like those in an architecture book.**

"**Annabeth," Chiron said, "I have masters' archery class at noon. Would you take Percy from here?"**

"**Yes, sir."**

"**Cabin eleven," Chiron told me, gesturing toward the doorway. "Make yourself at home."**

**Out of all the cabins, eleven looked the most like a regular old summer cabin, with the emphasis on _old_.**

Dylan and Ray didn't even look offended.

"It does look old," Dylan agreed.

"_Really _old," Nathan added.

**The threshold was worn down, the brown paint peeling. Over the doorway was on of those doctor's symbols, a winged pole with two snakes wrapped around it. What did they call it…? A caduceus.**

"At least he knew what it was," Shay said. "I thought it was called 'pole-thingy with two snakes on it.'"

"Of course you did," Talia told him.

**Inside, it was packed with people, both boys and girls, way more than the number of bunk beds. Sleeping bags were spread all over on the floor. It looked like a gym where the Red Cross had set up an evacuation center.**

"Why is it so packed?" Nathan asked.

"Maybe people love the Hermes cabin," Ella suggested, though she looked like she highly doubted that.

"Or…" Shay didn't even finish his sentence.

**Chiron didn't go in. The door was to low for him. But when the campers saw him they all stood and bowed respectfully.**

"**Well, then," Chiron said. "Good luck, Percy. I'll see you at dinner."**

**He galloped away toward the archery range.**

**I stood in the doorway, looking at the kids. They weren't bowing anymore. They were staring at me, sizing me up. I knew the routine. I'd gone through it at enough schools. **

"I hated that routine," Cayden grumbled.

"And you even punched someone in the face for it," Talia reminded him.

"That guy deserved it."

"For staring at you?" He nodded.

**So naturally I tripped coming in the door and made a total fool of myself. **

_When is not like you to do that? Oh, that's right, NEVER!_

**There were some snickers from the campers, but none of them said anything.**

**Annabeth announced, "Percy Jackson, meet cabin eleven."**

"**Regular or undetermined?" somebody asked.**

"What does that mean?" Jaycee wondered out load.

"Regular means he is the son of Hermes, undetermined means he wasn't claimed," I told her.

"But why wouldn't he be claimed?" Shay asked. "And why would he be in the Hermes cabin?" The question lingered in the air, and when Jaycee realized I wasn't going to answer, she continued to read.

**I didn't know what to say, but Annabeth said, "Undetermined."**

**Everybody groaned.**

**A guy who was little older than the rest came forward. "Now, now, campers. That's what we're here for. Welcome, Percy. You can have that spot on floor, right over there."**

"I think he could be the counselor," Talia said.

**The guy was about nineteen, and he looked pretty cool. He was tall and muscular, with short-cropped sandy hair and a friendly smile.**

I mentally scowled, so the others wouldn't become suspicious. Now Luke enters the plot.

**He wore an orange tank top, cutoffs, sandals, and a leather necklace with five different-colored clay beads.**

I saw the others finger their necklace, with a smile on their face.

**The only thing about his appearance was a thick white scar that ran just beneath his right eye to his jaw, like an old knife slash.**

"**This is Luke," Annabeth said, and her voice sounded different somehow. I glanced over and could've sworn she was blushing.**

"Oh Annabeth," I mumbled.

"When you told us how they died, you made it seem like they were together," Ella told me.

"Maybe I just made seem like that," I lied.

"Are you sure?" Nathan questioned.

"Um…"

They all grinned, like they figured it out. But they wouldn't know for sure for about four years.

**She saw me looking, and her expression hardened again. "He's your counselor for now."**

"**For now?" I asked.**

"**You're undetermined," Luke explained patiently. "They don't know what cabin to put you in, so you're here. Cabin eleven takes all newcomers, all visitors. Naturally we would. Hermes, our patron, is the god of travelers."**

"And is the god of thieves," Cayden added, eyeing Dylan and Ray.

**I looked at the tiny section of floor they'd given me. I had nothing to put there to mark it as my own, no luggage, no clothes, no sleeping bag. Just the Minotaur's horn. I thought about setting that down, but then I remembered that Hermes was also the god of thieves.**

"That was very smart of him," Ray admitted.

"I still haven't gotten my bracelet back from one of you half brothers," Ella reminded him.

"I'll get back to on that one," Ray told her while Dylan looked away. I think she means _real _brother instead.

**I looked around at the camper's faces, some sullen and suspicious, some grinning stupidly, some eyeing me as if they were waiting for a chance to pick my pockets.**

"**How long will I be here?" I asked.**

"**Good question," Luke said. "Until you're determined."  
><strong>

"**How long will that take?"**

"Whenever his father will claim him," I muttered.

**The campers all laughed.**

"**Come on," Annabeth told me. "I'll show you the volleyball court."**

"**I've already seen it."**

"She is trying to safe from any more embarrassment," Jaycee said. "Listen to her."

"**Come on."**

**She grabbed my wrist and dragged me outside. I could hear the kids of cabin eleven laughing behind me.**

**When we were a few feet away, Annabeth said, "Jackson, you have to do better than that."**

"**What?"**

**She rolled her eyes and mumbled under her breath, "I can't believe I thought you were the one."**

"The one," Dylan yelled, trying to be mysterious.

"I wonder why he is the one," Nathan said.

"**What's your problem?" I was getting angry now.**

And you can end up in the middle of an ocean. I remember that fight me and Percy had near the lake after capture the flag.

"**All I know is, I kill some bull guy-"**

"My new nick name for him," Shay told us.

"Which, if you think about it, does describe him well," Cayden added.

"**Don't talk like that!" Annabeth told me. "You know how many kids at this camp wish they'd had your chance?"**

"**To get killed?"**

The boys started to chuckle.

"I never thought of it like that," I said.

"**To fight the Minotaur! What do you think we train for?"**

**I shook my head. "Look, if the thing I fought really was _the _Minotaur, the same one in the stories…"**

"**Yes."**

"**Then there's only one."**

"**Yes."**

"**And he died, like, a gajillion years ago, right? Theseus killed him in the labyrinth. **

"At least he knows who killed the 'bull man,'" Cayden mumbled while Shay asked, "Is gajillion a word?"

No one answered Shay.

**So…"**

"**Monsters don't die, Percy. They can be killed. But they don't die."**

"**Oh, thanks. That clears it up."**

"Don't worry Percy, it never clears up," Nathan said.

"Not for about a few years," Ray added.

"Took me about three weeks," Ella disagreed with them.

"Well, that's just you."

"**They don't have souls, like you and me. You can dispel them for a while, maybe even for a whole lifetime if you're lucky. But they are primal forces. Chiron calls the archetypes. Eventually, they re-form."**

"And then you kill them again and again," I said.

**I thought about Mrs. Dodds. "You mean if I killed one, accidentally, with a sword-"**

"**The Fur…I mean, your math teacher. That's right. She's still out there. You just made her very, very mad."**

"**How did you know about Mrs. Dodds?"**

"**You talk in you sleep."**

"Another thing you have to worry about," Dylan chuckled.

"First he has to worry about drooling and now sleep talking," Talia added, smirking.

"He must be enjoying that."

"**You almost called her something. A Fury? They're Hades' torturers, right?"**

**Annabeth glanced nervously at the ground, as if she expected it to open up and swallow her.**

_Well, if Nico was maybe around, then that would happen._

"**You shouldn't call them by name, even here. We call them the Kindly Ones,**

"And they aren't always so kind," I grumbled.

"Maybe we should call them 'The Meany Boo-Beanies' instead," Shay suggested.

"But then Hades and the Kindly Ones will not be happy," Ray reminded him.

"Pftt, I don't care."

"Oh, but you will."

**if we have to speak of them at all."**

"**Look, is there anything we _can _say without it thundering?"**

"You might what to bring that up to the king of thunder Zeus," Dylan said.

**I sounded whiny, even to myself, but right then I didn't care. "Why do I have to stay in cabin eleven, anyway? Why is everybody so crowed together? There are plenty of empty bunks right over there."**

**I pointed to the first few cabins, and Annabeth turned pale. "You don't just choose a cabin, Percy. It depends on who your parents are. Or…your parent."**

**She stared at me, waiting for me to get it. **

"**My mom is Sally Jackson," I said. "She works at the candy store in Grand Central Station. At least, she used to."**

"**I'm sorry about your mom, Percy. But that's not what I mean. I'm talking about your other parent. Your dad."**

"Who is an all powerful Greek god!" Nathan screamed, dramatically.

"That can zap you into a pile of ashes," Jaycee threaten him.

"Oh please Percy's dad, can you do that for us?" Ray asked the sky, kneeling on the ground, trying to act dramatic.

"I don't think he will do that," I told him while the others chuckled. Nathan grumbled, "Why am I still friends with you guys?"

**Annabeth sighed. Clearly, she'd had this conversation before with other kids.**

"And if I did that, I would be pulling my hair out," Cayden mumbled.

"**Your father's not dead, Percy."**

"**How can you say that? You know him?"**

"No," Talia said. "She just knows that he is a god, or else you would be dead by now."

"And you wouldn't have seen the Minotaur," Ella added.

"**No, of course no."**

"**Then how can you say-"**

"**Because I know _you_. **

"Oh no!" Dylan yelled. "We have a stalker on our hands!"

**You wouldn't be here if you weren't one of us."**

"Unless someone summoned you," Jaycee said.

"**You don't know anything about me."**

"**No?" She raised an eyebrow. "I bet you moved around form school to school. I bet you were kicked out of a lot of them."**

"Mind reader much," Ray whispered.

"Or, she was just relating," Cayden told him.

_Not even close to the truth._

"**How-"**

"**Diagnosed with dyslexia. Probably ADHD, too."**

**I tried to swallow my embarrassment. "What does that have to do with anything?"**

"**Taken together, it's almost a sure sign. The letters float off the page when you read, right? That's because your mind is hardwired for ancient Greek.**

"Which is _way _better than English," Shay admitted, which we all agreed to.

"And is easier to read and write in," Ella added.

"Which is also better than Latin," Dylan whispered.

**And the ADHD-you're impulsive, can't sit still in the classroom. That's your battlefield reflexes. In a real fight, they'd keep you alive. As for the attention problems, that's because you see too much, Percy, not too little. Your senses are better than a regular mortal's. OF course the teachers want you medicated. Most of them are monsters. They don't want you seeing them for what they are."**

"And for some of them," Talia said, "we don't want to see."

"Because they are ugly!" Nathan pointed out.

"And because they deserve to taste the metal of my sword." Cayden scooted away from her.

"**You sound like…you went through the same thing?"**

_Not everything, but most of it is true for her._

"**Most of the kids here did. If you weren't like us, you couldn't have survived the Minotaur, much less the ambrosia and nectar."**

"**Ambrosia and nectar."**

"**The food and drink we were giving you to make you better. That stuff would've killed a normal kid. It would've turned your blood to fire and your bones to sand and you'd be dead. **

"Doesn't that make you feel all warm and fuzzy?" Ray muttered. "Makes you love being a half-blood."

"The best thing in the world, most of the time," I admitted. "If you don't get killed."

**Face it. You're a half-blood."**

**A half-blood.**

**I was reeling with so many questions I didn't know where to start.**

"We were all like that," Nathan said.

**Then a husky voice yelled, "Well! A newbie!"**

**I looked over. The big girl from the ugly red cabin was sauntering toward us. She had three other girls behind her, all big and ugly and mean looking like her, all wearing camo jackets. **

"They are your half siblings Cayden," I told him.

"Joy," was all he said.

"**Clarisse," Annabeth sighed. "Why don't you go polish your spear or something?"**

"**Sure, Miss Princess," the big girl said. "So I can you through with it Friday night."**

"**_Erre es korakas!_" Annabeth said, which I somehow understood was Greek for 'Go to the crows!' though I had a feeling it was a worse than it sounded.**

"Oh, it is," Shay said through his laughter.

"I can't believe she said that," I whispered. "But she probably would."

"**You don't stand a chance."**

"**We'll pulverize you," Clarisse said, but her eye twitched. Perhaps she wasn't sure she could follow through on the threat. **

Cayden groaned.

**She toward me. "Who's this little runt?"**

"**Percy Jackson," Annabeth said, "meet Clarisse, Daughter of Ares."**

**I blinked. "Like…the war god?"**

**Clarisse sneered. "You got a problem with that?"**

"**No," I said, recovering my wits. "It explains the bad smell."**

They all started laughing after seeing Cayden's expression.

"Not all of us smell."

Both Dylan and Ray shook their heads no but stopped when Cayden glared at them.

**Clarisse growled. "We got an initiation ceremony for newbies, Prissy."**

"**Percy."**

"**Whatever. Come on, I'll show you."**

_Show you? What are you planning Clarisse._

"**Clarisse-" Annabeth tried to say.**

"**Stay out of it, wise girl."**

**Annabeth looked pained, but she did stay out of it, and I didn't really want her help. I was the new kid. I had to earn my own rep.**

"Not really since this is a summer camp," Jaycee said.

"And because we are all like family," Ella added.

"And in every family," Ray started, "there are fights. Just like this one."

**I handed Annabeth my minotaur horn and got ready to fight, but before I knew it, Clarisse had me by the neck and was dragging me toward a cinder-block building that I knew immediately was the bathroom.**

"On second thought, I take that back," Ray said.

"What is your sister doing Cayden?" Talia asked him.

"How am I supposed to know?"

**I was kicking and punching. I'd been in plenty of fights before, but this big girl Clarisse had hands like iron. She dragged me into the girls' bathroom. There was a line of toilets on one side and a line of shower stalls down the other. It smelled just like any public bathroom, and I was thinking-as much as I _could _think with Clarisse ripping my hair out- that if this place belonged to the gods, they should've been able to afford classier johns.**

Many started to chuckle or full out laugh.

"Only you Percy," I muttered. "Only you would think of something like that."

**Clarisse's friends were all laughing, and I was trying to find the strength I'd used to fight the Minotaur, but it just wasn't there.**

"**Like he's Big Three' material,"**

_Oh the irony._

**Clarisse said as she pushed me toward one of the toilets. "Yeah, right. Minotaur probably fell over laughing, he was so stupid looking."**

**Her friends snickered.**

**Annabeth stood in the corner, watching through her fingers.**

"Shouldn't she be helping him?" Nathan wondered but the question lingered in the air.

**Clarisse bent me over on my knees and started pushing my head toward the toilet bowl. It reeked like rusted pipes and, well, like what goes into toilets. I strained to keep my head up. I was looking at the scummy water, thinking, I will no go into that. I won't.**

"Nobody does anyways," Ella said.

**Then something happened. I felt a tug in the pit of my stomach. I heard the plumbing rumble, the pipes shudder. Clarisse's grip on my hair loosened. Water shot out of the toilet, making an arc straight over my head, and the next thing I knew, I was sprawled on the bathroom tiles with Clarisse screaming behind me.**

They all were wide eye.

"Awesome!" Dylan yelled.

**I turned just as water blasted out of the toilet again, hitting Clarisse straight in the face so hard it pushed her down onto her butt. The water stayed on her like the spray from a fire hose, pushing her backward into a shower stall.**

**She struggled, gasping, and her friends started coming toward her. But then the other toilets exploded, too, and six more streams of toilet water blasted them back. The showers acted up, too, and together all the fixtures sprayed the camouflage girls right out of the bathroom, spinning them around like pieces of garbage being washed away.**

Some of the boys started to cheer for Percy.

"It does give you clues to who his father is," Jaycee whispered so quietly, only I could her.

"But don't say anything if you think you know who it is," I told her.

"Oh, don't worry. I wouldn't ruin it for the others."

**As soon as they were out the door, I felt the tug in my gut lessen, and the water shut off as quickly as it had started.**

**The entire bathroom was flooded. Annabeth hadn't been spared. She was dripping wet, but she hadn't been pushed out the door. She was standing in exactly the same place, staring at me in shock. **

"Most likely trying to figure out his parent," I said.

**I looked down and realized I was sitting in the only dry spot in the whole room. There was a circle of dry floor around me. I didn't have one drop of water on my clothes. Nothing.**

**I stood up, my legs shaky.**

"Probably because he freaked him out the most," Shay said. "I know I would be."

"That was really cool," Cayden admitted. "Not the fact my siblings got their buts kicked."

_And it is only the beginning of that happening._

**Annabeth said, "How did you…"**

"**I don't know."**

"The magic three word answer," Talia mumbled.

**We walked to the door. Outside, Clarisse and her friends were sprawled in the mud, and a bunch of other campers had gathered around to gawk.**

"Since it is not everyday you see that," Ella said.

**Clarisse's hair was flattened across her face. Her camouflage jacket was sopping and she smelled like sewage. She gave me a look of absolute hatred. "You are dead, new boy. You are totally dead."**

**I probably should have let it go, but I said, "You want to gargle with toilet water again, Clarisse? Close your mouth."**

"That does not make any since," Nathan said, looking puzzled.

"But that is Percy for you," I told him.

**Her friends had to hold her back. They dragged her toward cabin five, while the other campers made way to avoid her flailing feet.**

**Annabeth started at me. I couldn't tell whether she was just grossed out or angry at me for dousing her.**

"**What?" I demanded. "What are you thinking?"**

"**I'm thinking," she said, "that I want you on my team for capture the flag."**

Jaycee shut the book, tossing it to Shay.

* * *

><p><strong>I changed the years because I felt 60 years was not right. I will be replacing the first chapter so the years will be right. <strong>

**Now I haven't update in the amount of time that I wanted. Mostly because I had a volleyball tournament three weekends ago, I was at a soccer tournament two weekends ago, and last weekend, I seen the Hunger Games movie, had a sleepover, and went to a barbecue. The movie was good so I would say see it, even if you haven't read the books. If you read the books, you still will probably like it. Anyways, I will _try _this time to update in 1 orr 2 weeks. **

**~sciencelover**


	9. My Dinner Goes Up In Smoke

**Really sorry I haven't updated but I had about maybe three big projects, tests, volleyball tournaments, and a death in my family so please forgive me for not updating. Please stick with this story because if any of you think I will give up on this story, I won't. Just so you know.**

**Disclaimer- Nope. Don't live in the very warm state of Texas, so I am gussing I don't own PJO.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 9<p>

Thalia

Shay caught the book in his hands. "Read, like _right now_?"

We all nodded for him to read. He grumbled and turned to the right page. "We _will _take a break after this." He looked at us to question but no one did.

"**My Dinner Goes Up In Smoke**."

**Word of the bathroom incident spread immediately.**

"It wouldn't be camp if news didn't spread quickly," Ray smirked.

**Wherever I went, campers pointed at me and murmured something about toilet water. Or maybe they were just staring at Annabeth, who was still pretty much dripping wet.**

Me and the rest of the campers burst into fits of laughter.

"It was probably the latter one," I said. "Sorry to burst your ego."

**She showed me a few more places: the metal shop (where kids were forging their own swords),**

"And is a place Dylan and Shay are banned from," Jaycee added. Dylan and Shay started to protest, something about they didn't dump 50 gallons of hot sauce on the Hephaestus campers.

"And what they are denying, is actually want they did," Jaycee whispered to me. "They _really _did get 50 gallons of hot sauce and dumped it on the Hephaestus campers."

**the arts-and-crafts room (where satyr were sandblasting a giant marble statue of a goat-man), and the climbing wall, which actually consisted of two facing walls that shook violently, dropped boulders, sprayed lava, and clashed together if you didn't get to the top fast enough.**

**Finally we returned to the canoeing lake, where the trail led back to the cabins. **

"**I've got training to do," Annabeth said flatly. "Dinner's at seven-thirty. Just follow you cabin to the mess hall."**

"**Annabeth, I sorry about the toilets."**

"**Whatever."**

"**It wasn't my fault."**

I snorted at that. "You knew that's a lie Percy."

"You were the one that felt that tug in your stomach," Talia added.

Nathan nodded. "And you did cause the water to stop."

"So basically," Ella said, "All the evidence is pointing at you."

**She looked at me skeptically, and I realized it **_**was **_**my fault. I'd made water shoot out of the bathroom fixtures. I didn't understand how. But the toilets had responded to me. I had become one with the plumbing.**

Another round of laughter came.

"He even agrees with us!" Nathan shouted.

"And he realized some of his powers," Cayden told him.

"**You need to talk to the Oracle," Annabeth said.**

"**Who?"**

"**Now who. What.**

"Why would the Oracle be a what, not a who?" Ell asked, looking perplexed.

"Something…happened, well you'll see later on," I told her. She still looked perplexed.

**The Oracle. I'll ask Chiron."**

**I stared into the lake, wishing somebody would give me a straight answer for once. **

"Don't we all," Dylan agreed.

**I wasn't expecting anybody to be looking back at me from the bottom, so my heart skipped a beat when I noticed two teenage girls sitting cross-legged at the base of the pier, about twenty feet below. They wore blue jeans and shimmering green T-shirts, and their brown hair floated loose around their shoulders as minnows darted in and out. They smiled and waved as if I were a long-lost friend.**

_Since you are the son of Poseidon, you are like a 'long-lost friend'. _

**I didn't know what else to do. I waved back.**

"**Don't encourage them," Annabeth warned. "Naiads are terrible flirts."**

"Somebody's jealous," Jaycee said, chuckling.

Dylan, trying to act dramatic, put his hand over his eye yelling, "I am seeing red!"

Jaycee leaned over and hit him on the head.

"I hate it when you do that," he grumbled.

"**Naiads," I repeated, feeling completely overwhelmed. "That's it. I want to go home now."**

"Many always feel like that," Ray muttered. Others nodded their heads in agreement.

**Annabeth frowned. "Don't you get it, Percy? You _are _home. This is the only safe place on earth for kids like us."**

"No, there is always the Roman camp," Cayden supplied.

I looked at them. "You know about the Roman camp?"

They all nodded, like it was perfectly normally. "We see them twice a year, to verse each other in Capture the Flag and in their war games," Talia told me.

"Why? You guys didn't do that?" Shay asked.

"No. We didn't know about the Roman camp for a couple of years, after this," I told them.

"Things sure have changed," Nathan whispered.

"And you will soon find out how we became to know about the Roman camp, after we finish this book and four more." I added the last part when they started to perk up about hearing that.

"**You mean, mentally disturbed kids?"**

I snorted while the other campers laughed.

"Well, most of them," I said. "But not all of them."

"**I mean _not human_. Not totally human, anyway. Half-human."**

"**Half-human and half-what?"**

"**I think you know."**

**I didn't want to admit it, but I was afraid I did. I felt a tingling in my limbs, a sensation I sometimes felt when my mom talked about my dad.**

"**God," I said. "Half-god."**

"It finally passes through his head!" Nathan shouted, clapping for him.

"You shouldn't be the one to talk," Ella told him. "It took you about a month to accept being half god."

He frowned and glared at her. She equal glared back him. Shay took it as his cue to continue.

**Annabeth nodded. "Your father isn't dead, Percy. He's one of the Olympians."**

"Or a minor goddess," Shay grumbled, but his facial expression made it seem like he disagreed about what she said. Which is true since his mom is Hecate.

"**That's…crazy."**

"**Is it? What's the most common thing gods did in the old stories? They ran around falling in love with humans and having kids with them. Do you think they've changed their habits in the last few millennia?"**

"I think everyone would be surprised if they actually _did _change their ways," Ella commented.

"I would faint," Dylan pointed out.

"**But those are just-" I almost said _myths _again. Then I remembered Chiron's warning that in two thousand years, _I _might be considered a myth. "But if all the kids here are half-gods-"**

"**Demigods," Annabeth said. "That's the official term. Or half-bloods."**

"I prefer demigods," Ray said. "It makes me feel godly."

"Yes because doing pranks makes you a god," Talia told him, her voice full of sarcasm.

"**Then who's your dad?"**

_Now you're dead. _I remembered during this time, Annabeth and her dad didn't, well, didn't see eye-to-eye.

**Her hands tightened around the pier railing. I got the feeling I'd just trespassed on a sensitive subject.**

"**My dad is a professor at West Point," she said. "I haven't seen him since I was very small. He teaches American history."**

"**He's human."**

I face palmed. "You got to be kidding me Percy."

"That was definitely not the right thing to say," Cayden said.

"That was also very sexist," Jaycee added.

"**What? You assume it has to be a male god who finds a human female attractive? How sexist is that?"**

"Like Jaycee said, very," Shay chuckled.

"It was the truth," she mumbled.

"**Who's your mom, then?"**

"**Cabin six."**

"Athena," chorused from many of the campers.

"**Meaning?"**

**Annabeth straightened. "Athena. Goddess of wisdom and battle."**

"And having good revenge plans," Ray added, shuddering while rubbing his arms.

**Okay, I thought. Why not?**

"**And my dad?"**

"Sorry Percy but she doesn't know," Talia said.

Shay started to laugh at that. "What?"

"I just thought it would be funny if she knew." She gave him a look, like: _Are you really that stupid?_

"**Undetermined," Annabeth said, "like I told you before. Nobody knows."**

"**Except my mother. She knew."**

"**Maybe not, Percy. Gods don't always reveal their identities."**

"**My dad would have. He loved her."**

**Annabeth gave me a cautious look. She didn't want to burst my bubble.**

"Now if it was me," Nathan started, "I would have busted their bubble."

"And that's why Chiron won't let you take the new campers around," Cayden told him.

"I doubt he wanted you to do it in the first place," Ella added.

"**Maybe you're right. Maybe he'll send a sign. That's the only way to know for sure: your father has to send you a sign claiming you as his son. Sometimes it happens."**

Jaycee frowned at that. "Now, why wouldn't it happen? Most of the time when a new camper shows up, they immediately get claimed." The others nodded in agreement. I looked away, knowing how things changed, not wanting to ruin it for them.

"**You mean sometimes it doesn't?"**

**Annabeth ran her palm along the rail. "The gods are busy. They have a lot of kids and they don't always… Well, sometimes they don't care about us, Percy. They ignore us."**

"That is not right," Talia huffed. Others nodded in agreement.

**I thought about some of the kids I'd seen in the Hermes cabin, teenagers who looked sullen and depressed, as if they were waiting for a call that would never come. I'd known kids like that at Yancy Academy, shuffled off to boarding school by rich parents who didn't have the time to deal with them. But gods should have been better.**

"**So I'm stuck here," I said. "That's it? For the rest of my life?"**

"You could go home for the school year," Dylan pointed out.

"Or stay at camp year round," Ray added.

"**It depends," Annabeth said. "Some campers only stay the summer. If you're a child of Aphrodite or Demeter, you're probably not a real powerful force.**

Nathan and Ella looked a little offended but nodded like it was true. Ray just laughed at his girlfriend.

"I wouldn't be talking," she told him. "It probably applies to _you _too."

**The monsters might ignore you, so you can get by with a few months of summer training and live in the mortal world the rest of the year. But for some of us, it's too dangerous to leave. We're year-rounders. In the mortal world, we attract monsters. They sense us. They come to challenge us.**

"And most people accept the challenge," I said while the others looked at Cayden. If Clarisse was here, she would _defiantly_ agree with Annabeth. I sighed. Great now I miss Clarisse.

**Most of the time, they'll ignore us until we're old enough to cause trouble-about ten or eleven years old, but after that, most demigods either make their way here, or they get killed off. A few manage to survive in the outside worlds and become famous. Believe me, if I told you the names, you'd know them. Some don't even realize they're demigods. But very, very few are like that."**

"**So monsters can't get in here?"**

**Annabeth shook her head. "Not unless they're intentionally stocked in the woods or specially summoned by somebody on the inside."**

I remembered Annabeth telling me that Luke summoned a hellhound to attack Percy. I can't believe he would do that. But in the end, he was a hero.

"**Why would anybody want to summon a monster?"**

"**Practice fights. Practical jokes."**

Dylan started to look away and whistle, so I had a feeling he did something involving summoning a monster.

Jaycee whispered to me, "Dylan summoned a baby hellhound to destroy the flowers around the Demeter cabin. Not his best idea considering every flower he passed tripped him."

"**Practical jokes?"**

"**The point is, the borders are sealed to keep mortals and monsters out. From the outside, mortals look into the valley and see nothing unusual, just a strawberry farm."**

"Unless they can see through the mist cause then they see people attacking each other with swords," Shay said.

"I can imagine them freaking out, thinking they are going crazy," Nathan added. "We should find a mortal who can see through the mist and bring them here."

"And see if they might be put in a padded room!"

Talia slapped them on the head. "That would not be good!"

"Just embrace the craziness of the plan and you'll love it!" Shay told her.

"I prefer to not embrace that Shay."

"**So…you're a year-rounder?"**

**Annabeth nodded. From under the collar of her T-shirt she pulled a leather necklace with five clay beads of different colors. It was just like Luke's, except Annabeth's also had a big gold ring strung on it, like a college ring.**

"Her father must have sent her that," Ella guessed.

"**I've been here since I was seven," she said. **

"She came here so young," Jaycee said. "I wonder why."

"**Every August, on the last day of summer session, you get a bead for surviving another year. I've been here longer than most of the counselors, and they're all in college."**

"**Why did you come so young?"**

"That's what we all want to know," Dylan thought.

"You'll find out soon," I told them.

**She twisted the ring on her necklace. "None of your business."**

"So much for finding out soon," Shay complained.

"**Oh." I stood there for a minute in uncomfortable silence. "So…I could just walk out of here right now if I wanted to?"**

"That would be very unlikely," Cayden stated. "You would be in big trouble. You basically are signing your death notice."

"You are on creepy little dude," Ray told him.

"We are the same height, though."

"You know what I meant."

"**It would be suicide, but you could, with Mr. D's or Chiron's permission. But they wouldn't give permission until the end of the summer session unless…"**

"**Unless?"**

"**You were granted a quest. But that hardly ever happens. The last time…"**

**Her voice trailed off. I could tell from her tone that the last time hadn't gone well.**

"Some many things are happening and we don't know what heck is going on," Dylan complained.

"Percy doesn't know either," Jaycee pointed out. "So he might find out these answers and then we will know."

"But that will take forever." He stopped after she gave him a glare.

"**Back in the sick room," I said, "when you were feeding me that stuff-"**

"**Ambrosia."**

"**Yeah. You asked me something about the summer solstice."**

**Annabeth's shoulders tensed. "So you _do _know something?"**

"**Well…no. **

"And he breaks her hope of knowing something," Shay shouted.

"Shay, you don't need to shout," Talia reminded him. "We are indoors."

"But it makes everything sound more exciting."

"Just read before I make you rhyme."

**Back at my old school, I overheard Grover and Chiron talking about it. Grover mentioned the summer solstice. He said something like we didn't have much time, because of the deadline. What did that mean?"**

**She clenched her fists. "I wish I knew. Chiron and the satyrs, the know, but they won't tell me. Something is wrong in Olympus, something pretty major. Last time I was there, everything seemed so _normal_."**

"As normal as it gets with ten foot tall gods walking around," Ray chuckled.

"And some being a thousand years old but appear our age," Ella added.

"If only I could do that," Nathan said. "If I did, Vegas here I come!"

"**You've been to Olympus?"**

"**Some of us year-rounder- Luke and Clarisse and I and a few others- we took a field trip during winter solstice. That's when the gods have their big annual council."**

"**But…how did you get there?"**

"**The Long Island Railroad, of course. You get off at Penn Station. Empire State Building, special elevator the six hundredth floor." **

"Now we can stalk the gods," Dylan shirked.

Jaycee shook her head at him. "First, you already knew where Olympus was so that won't work, smart one. Second, Chiron would never let you do that. He did overhear you talking about doing that last year."

Dylan grumbled something like, "Stupid Chiron for not letting me do it."

**She looked at me like she was sure I must know this already.**

I snorted. "Yea, like _that_ will happen."

"**You _are _a New Yorker, right?"**

"He may be from New York," Talia said, "but it doesn't mean he would know that."

"**Oh, sure." As far as I knew, there were only a hundred and two floors in the Empire State Building, but I decided not to point that out.**

"**Right after we visited," Annabeth continued, "the weather got weird, as if the gods had started fighting. A couple of times since, I've overheard satyrs talking. The best I can figure out is that something important was stolen. **

"Now who would be stupid enough to steal something from the Gods?" Cayden asked no one in particular.

_Let me guess, it was probably Luke. Oh, wait, it _was _Luke. And that was all I knew. If only they told me more than little pieces here and there._

**And if it isn't returned by summer solstice, there's going to be trouble. When you came, I was hoping… I mean- Athena can get along with just about anybody, except for Ares. And of course she's got the rivalry with Poseidon.**

"But that won't stop their love," Nathan whispered, a little too loud. Of course, what he said is true.

**But, I mean, aside from that, I thought we could work together. I thought you might know something."**

**I shook my head. I wished I could help her, but I felt too hungry and tired and mentally overloaded to ask any more questions.**

"**I've got to get a quest," Annabeth muttered to herself. "I'm _not _too young. If they would just tell me the problem…"**

"Highly unlikely," Ella said. "Chiron always keeps things to himself."

"And when you least expect it, he might tell you," Shay added.

**I could smell barbecue smoke coming from somewhere nearby. Annabeth must've heard my stomach growl. She told me to go on, she'd catch me later. I left her on the pier, tracing her finger across the rail as if drawing a battle plan. **

I snorted. "She is always making plans."

At the same time, Ray said, "Typical children of Athena, always making battle and revenge plans."

"Mostly for you and Dylan and Shay and Nathan and Ray-" Ella said but stopped when she was getting looks from said boys, only Ray didn't.

**Back at cabin eleven, everybody was talking and horsing around, waiting for dinner. For the first time, I noticed that a lot of the campers had similar features: sharp noses, upturned eyebrows, mischievous smiles. They were the kind of kids that teachers would peg as troublemakers. **

"Those would be the Hermes kids," Cayden said, pointing at the two sons of Hermes.

"You know that those classes wouldn't be fun without us," Ray protested.

"Maybe," Jaycee agreed, "But then you don't get anything done and you would be in trouble all the time."

**Thankfully, nobody paid much attention to me as I walked over to my spot on the floor and plopped down with my minotaur horn. **

**The counselor, Luke, came over. He had the Hermes family resemblance, too. It was marred by that scar on his right cheek, but his smile was intact.**

"**Found you a sleeping bag," he said. "And here, I stole you some toiletries from the camp store."**

**I couldn't tell if he was kidding about the stealing part.**

"Since he is a son of Hermes, he probably wasn't," Talia said. "Most of them would rather steal than pay,"

**I said, "Thanks."**

"**No prob." Luke sat next to me, pushed his back against the wall. "Tough first day?"**

"Almost everybody has a tough first day," Nathan muttered. The others nodded in agreement.

"**I don't belong here," I said. "I don't even believe in gods."**

"**Yeah," he said. "That's how we all started. Once you start believing in them? It doesn't get any easier."**

Ella frowned at that. "It did get a little easier for me. I wonder why it didn't for him."

"Me too," Dylan agreed. "Almost everybody I asked said it got easier after a couple weeks, more or less."

"I guess it didn't for him."

**The bitterness in his voice surprised me, because Luke seemed like a pretty easygoing guy. He looked like he could handle just about anything.**

"**So your dad is Hermes?" I asked.**

**He pulled a switchblade out of his back pocket, and for a second I thought he was going to gut me, but he just scraped the mud off the sole of his sandal.**

_I wouldn't have been surprised if he did try to gut you. From what Annabeth told me, he changed after coming back from his quest. _

"**Yeah. Hermes."**

"**The wing-footed messenger guy."**

"Well, it is his shoes that have the wings," Ray corrected, through his laughter.

"**That's him. Messengers. Medicine. Travelers, merchants, thieves. Anybody who uses the roads. That's why you're here, enjoying cabin eleven's hospitality. Hermes isn't picky about who he sponsors."**

**I figured Luke didn't mean to call me a nobody. He just had a lot on his mind.**

_Like helping Kronos, even though he _did_ help save the world in the end. But he probably did mean to call you a nobody. _

"**You ever meet your dad?" I asked.**

"**Once."**

_Not the best time of my life._

**I waited, thinking that if he wanted to tell me, he'd tell me. Apparently, he didn't. I wondered if the story had anything to do with how he got his scar.**

**Luke looked up and managed a smile. "Don't worry about it, Percy. The campers here, they're mostly good people. **

Ella shot Dylan a pointed look. "Except for the campers who set the roof of my cabin on fire."

Dylan looked confused. "But that was Ray."

"You told me it was your brother," she yelled at him.

"Sorry?" It came out more of a question.

"You should be Ray."

**After all, we're extended family, right? We take care of each other."**

_Sounds better when Percy said it to all the new campers. _

"Most campers take care of each other," Shay said, "But some prank or hurt you in sword fighting class." He gave pointed to looks to Cayden, Dylan, and Ray.

"Sometimes you are in on the pranks," Ella reminded him.

"And you don't pay attention most of the time when we duel against each other," Cayden added.

"I was thinking of… how to… beat… you?" He protested, but it came out more of a question.

**He seemed to understand how lost I felt, and I was grateful for that, because an older guy like him—even if he was a counselor—should've steered clear of an uncool middle-schooler like me. But Luke had welcomed me into the cabin. He'd even stolen me some toiletries, which was the nicest thing anybody had done for me all day.**

"When he puts it like that, it sounds so sad," Talia said.

"Our lives are sad," I told her.

"Wars, though we haven't had a major one in like a hundred years, but there are the quest that go wrong. But we barely give quest anymore."

**I decided to ask him my last big question, the one that had been bothering me all afternoon.**

**"Clarisse, from Ares, was joking about me being 'Big Three' material. Then Annabeth ... twice, she said I might be 'the one.' She said I should talk to the Oracle. What was that all about?"**

"Well," Nathan started. "Clarisse means you might be the son of Zeus, Hades, or Poseidon. As for Annabeth, maybe she is hinting at something else." He was wiggling his eyebrows at the last part.

Jaycee threw a pillow at his head. "They are twelve at the time idiot!"

"I mean dating crazy woman!" She started to glare at him and Nathan quickly told Shay to hurry up and read.

**Luke folded his knife. "I hate prophecies."**

**"What do you mean?"**

**His face twitched around the scar. "Let's just say I messed things up for everybody else. The last two years, ever since my trip to the Garden of the Hesperides went sour, Chiron hasn't allowed any more quests. Annabeth's been dying to get out into the world.**

"I don't blame her if she was at camp since she was seven," Ella whispered.

**She pestered Chiron so much he finally told her he already knew her fate. He'd had a prophecy from the Oracle. He wouldn't tell her the whole thing, but he said Annabeth wasn't destined to go on a quest yet. She had to wait until... somebody special came to the camp." **

**"Somebody special?"**

**"Don't worry about it, kid," Luke said. "Annabeth wants to think every new camper who comes through here is the omen she's been waiting for. Now, come on, it's dinnertime."**

**The moment he said it, a horn blew in the distance. Somehow, I knew it was a conch shell, even though I'd never heard one before.**

"Probably because your dad is the god of the sea," I suggested. At the same time, Dylan yelled,

"Because of your fishy powers Percy!"

"Um, no I don't think so," I told him, looking at him strangely.

**Luke yelled, "Eleven, fall in!"**

**The whole cabin, about twenty of us, filed into the commons yard. We lined up in order of seniority, so of course I was dead last. Campers came from the other cabins, too, except for the three empty cabins at the end, and cabin eight, which had looked normal in the daytime, but was now starting to glow silver as the sun went down**.

I smiled. The best cabin the camp ever had.

**We marched up the hill to the mess hall pavilion. Satyrs joined us from the meadow. Naiads emerged from the canoeing lake. A few other girls came out of the woods— and when I say out of the woods, I mean straight out of the woods. I saw one girl, about nine or ten years old, melt from the side of a maple tree and come skipping up the hill.**

Ray shook his head in amusement. "The way he says it makes it sound so magical."

"Or completely normal," Talia argued. "He says it like it is no big deal."

"It is not fun though when you are playing tag with a tree nymph and when you think you catched them, then turn into a tree. Then you kiss their stupid trunk," Shay grumbled.

"You could use magic to tag them," Cayden suggested.

"But they are so beautiful so when they tell me not to, I give in."

**In all, there were maybe a hundred campers, a few dozen satyrs, and a dozen assorted wood nymphs and naiads.**

**At the pavilion, torches blazed around the marble columns. A central fire burned in a bronze brazier the size of a bathtub. Each cabin had its own table, covered in white cloth trimmed in purple. Four of the tables were empty, but cabin eleven's was way overcrowded. I had to squeeze on to the edge of a bench with half my butt hanging off.**

"So stupid how most of the campers never get claimed," Cayden grumbled. "It is so not right."

"I would hate being stuck with people who may or may not be my siblings," Ella admitted.

**I saw Grover sitting at table twelve with Mr. D, a few satyrs, and a couple of plump blond boys who looked just like Mr. D. Chiron stood to one side, the picnic table being way too small for a centaur.**

**Annabeth sat at table six with a bunch of serious-looking athletic kids, all with her gray eyes and honey-blond hair.**

**Clarisse sat behind me at Ares's table. She'd apparently gotten over being hosed down, because she was laughing and belching right alongside her friends.**

"She probably forgot by the time she got with her siblings," Jaycee said.

"Or she went to the arena and chopped off the heads of the dummies," I suggested, since that I would believe more.

**Finally, Chiron pounded his hoof against the marble floor of the pavilion, and everybody fell silent. He raised a glass. "To the gods!"**

**Everybody else raised their glasses. "To the gods!"**

"Chiron told me that if we didn't, we would either have stable cleaning duty or kitchen duty," Nathan informed us.

"I will always say it for now on," Dylan gulped.

**Wood nymphs came forward with platters of food: grapes, apples, strawberries, cheese, fresh bread, and yes, barbecue!**

_Every man's dream._

**My glass was empty, but Luke said, "Speak to it. Whatever you want- nonalcoholic, of course."**

**I said, "Cherry Coke."**

**The glass filled with sparkling caramel liquid.**

**Then I had an idea. "Blue Cherry Coke."**

"What would that even look like?" Shay wondered.

"I think it is sweet," Ella admitted. "He did that for his mother."

I grinned at that. It did sound like Percy.

**The soda turned a violent shade of cobalt**.

"Now you know what that would look like," Dylan told Shay.

**I took a cautious sip. Perfect.**

**I drank a toast to my mother.**

**She's not gone, I told myself. Not permanently, anyway. She's in the Underworld. And if that's a real place, then someday...**

"Is he crazy?" Cayden asked.

"Or mentally insane," Ray added.

"Or loony in the brain," Talia suggested.

I shook my head. "Or just really loyal." Percy did tell me what his fatal flaw was personal loyalty. It is something I did believe. Ray just waved me off, like his reason was better but Talia nodded like maybe, just maybe, I could be telling the truth.

**"Here you go, Percy," Luke said, handing me a platter of smoked brisket.**

**I loaded my plate and was about to take a big bite when I noticed everybody getting up, carrying their plates toward the fire in the center of the pavilion. I wondered if they were going for dessert or something.**

"That must be it Percy," I said, my voice oozing sarcasm.

**"Come on," Luke told me.**

**As I got closer, I saw that everyone was taking a portion of their meal and dropping it into the fire, the ripest strawberry, the juiciest slice of beef, the warmest, most buttery roll.**

"Our parents will only accept the best," Nathan muttered.

"And cheat me out of my best strawberries," Ella grumbled, though she didn't look mad about it.

**Luke murmured in my ear, "Burnt offerings for the gods. They like the smell."**

**"You're kidding."**

**His look warned me not to take this lightly, but I couldn't help wondering why an immortal, all-powerful being would like the smell of burning food.**

**Luke approached the fire, bowed his head, and tossed in a cluster of fat red grapes. "Hermes."**

**I was next. I wished I knew what god's name to say.**

**Finally, I made a silent plea.**

_**Whoever you are, tell me. Please**_**.**

"If you're lucky, they will answer your prayer," Jaycee said.

Cayden nodded. "My dad answered my prayer when I asked for a new sword."

"I think Percy was hoping that he would be claimed," I told him.

"Well his father might answer that too."

**I scraped a big slice of brisket into the flames.**

**When I caught a whiff of the smoke, I didn't gag.**

**It smelled nothing like burning food. It smelled of hot chocolate and fresh-baked brownies, hamburgers on the grill and wildflowers, and a hundred other good things that shouldn't have gone well together, but did.**

"Because the smoke has magic powers!" Dylan yelled.

"I am not sure about your theory," Ella told him while Shay was knocking his fist against his head asking, "Is anybody home?"

**I could almost believe the gods could live off that smoke.**

**When everybody had returned to their seats and finished eating their meals, Chiron pounded his hoof again for our attention.**

**Mr. D got up with a huge sigh. "Yes, I suppose I'd better say hello to all you brats. Well, hello. Our activities director, Chiron, says the next capture the flag is Friday. Cabin five presently holds the laurels."**

**A bunch of ugly cheering rose from the Ares table.**

**"Personally," Mr. D continued, "I couldn't care less, but congratulations. Also, I should tell you that we have a new camper today. Peter Johnson."**

"That is not even close to Percy Jackson," Talia said.

I nodded. "That is basically what Mr. D calls him."

"At least it is better then Tillie," she admitted.

"Or Shawna," Shay grumbled.

"That is a girls name though," I said.

"Try telling that to _him_."

**Chiron murmured something.**

**"Er, Percy Jackson," Mr. D corrected. "That's right. Hurrah, and all that. Now run along to your silly campfire. Go on."**

**Everybody cheered. We all headed down toward the amphitheater, where Apollo's cabin led a sing-along.**

"Well, who else would lead it?" Nathan asked, shaking his head.

"Apollo, duh!" Ray shirked.

**We sang camp songs about the gods and ate s'mores and joked around, and the funny thing was, I didn't feel that anyone was staring at me anymore. I felt that I was home.**

**Later in the evening, when the sparks from the campfire were curling into a starry sky, the conch horn blew again, and we all filed back to our cabins. I didn't realize how exhausted I was until I collapsed on my borrowed sleeping bag. My fingers curled around the Minotaur's horn. I thought about my mom, but I had good thoughts: her smile, the bedtime stories she would read me when I was a kid, the way she would tell me not to let the bedbugs bite. When I closed my eyes, I fell asleep instantly.**

**That was my first day at Camp Half-Blood.**

**I wish I'd known how briefly I would get to enjoy my new home.**

"The art of foreshadowing," Shay said, closing the book. He tossed it at Talia and then ran out the door yelling, "Meet me in the arena!"

"To the arena we go then," Talia muttered before heading out the door, all of us following suit.

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><p><strong>Okay so good news- I found a faster way to write the chapters so, hopefully, I will update faster. I am trying to write the next chapter, which will be them taking a break and talking. You will learn a little more about my OCs. So I might upload it maybe a hour. If you read this write Not Over You in your review. <strong>

**~sciencelover**


	10. To The Arena We Go

**Thank you all for reviewing. I am going to address a couple of things at the end that were brought to my attention.**

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><p>Chapter 10<p>

Thalia

Shay was at the arena, like he said he would be. He was laying on the floor for some reason but sat up when we entered.

"Okay Shay," Ella started, "Why are we in the arena?"

"We are taking a break."

"There are other places to hang out at."

"But I like it here." Ella just sighed and probably thought it would be best to just sit down next to Shay. Ray sat next to her, than Jaycee, me, Dylan, Nathan, Talia, and Cayden. We all sat in a giant circle.

"So," Nathan said breaking the silence, "How old are you exactly Thalia?"

"Well I am pretty sure I am about 186 years old, give or take a few years," I admitted. When Nathan looked at me strangely, I quickly asked how long they knew each other. But then I realized how stupid that sounded.

"About six years," Jaycee answered. "I sometimes will go home during the school year to see my dad and my half brother from my dad's previous marriage."

"I never really go home," Nathan admitted. "I don't really like my step mom and my one step brother. He calls me a girl."

"Well sometimes you do act like one," Shay told him.

"That's because I have my mom's genes in me! At least I don't always obsess about my clothes or my hair or what my face looks like. Speaking of my face, I need more facial wash…"

"Okay, too much information," Talia interrupted. "Maybe I will practice my archery while I am here." With that she ran to the edge of the arena, where a couple of bows and cases of arrows were, and grabbed a gold bow with a matching set of gold arrows. She nocks three arrows and let them fly at a nearby target. All three hit the bull's eye. She must have not been happy with that because she gave a heavy sigh.

Cayden shook his head at her. "Talia is obsessed with archery and thinks everything she shoots at misses by ten miles."

"Which is pretty stupid if you ask me," Ray said. "I mean, she already knows she is good so she should stop obsessing already."

"Like you never obsess over anything," Shay told him. "Remember the time you were obsessed over a certain daughter of Demeter last year."

Ray started to blush a deep shade of red muttering, "Why do I tell you anything?"

"Before you say anything else, let's read one more chapter before dinner," Ella suggested, who was blushing the same shade of red as Ray. We all nodded. Talia came back over and we all headed back to her cabin. She grabbed the book from behind one of the pillows and tossed the book to Ella, who quickly opened the book to the right page and started to read.

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><p><strong>There were some reviews that caught my attention. Now there are some reviews I want to comment on. One reviewer (Percabeth Trumps Jasper) suggested bring the ghost of Percy and his friends in the story as ghost and read the books with them. That thought had crossed my mine before but I will be putting up a poll later today about what you think about that. Now second, I do relize that Percy can easily put the flames out and save him and Annabeth. I know that but Thalia didn't have much detail when she told the other campers. When they read who Percy is the son of, while you can guess they will question Thalia. That is all I will tell you because you will find out more about that in the next chapter. If you read this, please put Who Dat Girl in your review. <strong>

**~sciencelover.**

*****Check my profile for a poll!*****


	11. We Capture a Flag

**Yes, I know I am horrible for not updating in forever. Final exams, bonfires, vacation, tennis lessons, marching band. The list of reasons for not updating could go on but I will stop there. Important authours note at the bottom.**

**Disclaimer- Not the owner of PJO.**

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><p>Chapter 11<p>

Thalia

We quickly sat down as Ella caught the book Talia threw. She looked down at the title and grinned. She looked at all the boys before reading, "**We Capture a Flag**."

"Finally!" Cayden cheered. "Time to see what skills Percy has."

"But you won't actually be able to see it Cayden," Shay told him innocently. "Shutting up now," he said after seeing the look Cayden gave him.

**The next few days I settled into a routine that felt almost normal, if you don't count the fact that I was getting lessons from satyrs, nymphs, and a centaur.**

"Really? I never notice," Ray said, oozing sarcasm.

"If I remember correctly, you were freaked out after your first lesson," Talia told him. "You had a really blank look in your eyes. Your eyes barely moved when I was flashing my light in front of you."

"That nymph kept looking at me weird, like I just killed her cousin."

**Each morning I took Ancient Greek from Annabeth, and we talked about the gods and goddesses in the present tense, which was kind of weird. I discovered Annabeth was right about my dyslexia: Ancient Greek wasn't that hard for me to read. At least, no harder than English.**

**After a couple of mornings, I could stumble through a few lines of Homer without too much headache.**

_Totally agree with you Perce. At least you didn't think it was Homer Simpson like the Stolls did…_

**The rest of the day, I'd rotate through outdoor activities, looking for something I was good at.**

**Chiron tried to teach me archery,**

"The stupidest thing you could ever do," I muttered. Several of the campers looked at me trying to figure out what I meant.

**but we found out pretty quick I wasn't any good with a bow and arrow. He didn't complain, even when he had to desnag a stray arrow out of his tail.**

Many of the campers snorted and chuckled, while Dylan, Ray, and Shay were laughing like hyenas.

**Foot racing? No good either. The wood-nymph instructors left me in the dust. They told me not to worry about it. They'd had centuries of practice running away from lovesick gods. But still, it was a little humiliating to be slower than a tree.**

**And wrestling? Forget it. Every time I got on the mat, Clarisse would pulverize me.**

**"There's more where that came from, punk," she'd mumble in my ear.**

**The only thing I really excelled at was canoeing,**

I could practically see the gears turning in Ella's head. She was giving me a look, like she already figured who his parent. I gave her a look in return. Luckily she understood what I meant.

While this was going on, the other campers were snorting.

**and that wasn't the kind of heroic skill people expected to see from the kid who had beaten the Minotaur.**

"To must people, it would matter. But personally, who cares? You can do canoeing _and _you can fight," Talia pointed out.

"It is also seems to be like that," Ella said. "Take Shay. He _can't _change an apple to a bee but can make five people's hair burst into flames."

"I don't think I was talking about something like that."

"Well sorry but you know it is true." Shay started pout.

**I knew the senior campers and counselors were watching me, trying to decide who my dad was, but they weren't having an easy time of it.**

"I would imagine if many campers didn't get claimed right away. It would make it harder on the counselors to figure out if they had a new half-sibling," Cayden pointed out.

**I wasn't as strong as the Ares kids, or as good at archery as the Apollo kids. **

"Good wouldn't describe how horrible you are at in doing archery," I corrected. "Never practiced with you after that one day."

"What happened," Ray asked, curious.

"He hit a tree a few feet away from the target. It didn't help that it was a few inches above my head."

**I didn't have Hephaestus's skill with metalwork or—gods forbid— Dionysus's way with vine plants. Luke told me I might be a child of Hermes, a kind of jack-of-all-trades, master of none. But I got the feeling he was just trying to make me feel better. He really didn't know what to make of me either.**

**Despite all that, I liked camp. I got used to the morning fog over the beach, the smell of hot strawberry fields in the afternoon, even the weird noises of monsters in the woods at night. I would eat dinner with cabin eleven, scrape part of my meal into the fire, and try to feel some connection to my real dad. Nothing came. Just that warm feeling I'd always had, like the memory of his smile.**

"So his dad must have visited him at one point," Jaycee guessed.

"It seems unusual but I guess he could have," Nathan muttered. "I never have heard of a god doing that before."

"But sometimes our godly parents visit us," Shay told him.

"But not when we are younger."

**I tried not to think too much about my mom, but I kept wondering: if gods and monsters were real, if all this magical stuff was possible, surely there was some way to save her, to bring her back...**

Murmurs of _crazy_ were heard throughout the campers.

"He must really love his mom if he would go to the Underworld," Ella pointed out.

Nathan nodded. "Love for a family is always the sweetest, after your love for chocolate of course."

Some stared at him like he was crazy.

"After chocolate?" I questioned. "That seems so unusual."

"Chocolate is so delicious and sometimes creamy and it melts on your tongue…" He got some _Are-you-serious _look.

**I started to understand Luke's bitterness and how he seemed to resent his father, Hermes. So okay, maybe gods had important things to do. But couldn't they call once in a while, or thunder, or something?**

_One of the reasons why many joined the other side._

**Dionysus could make Diet Coke appear out of thin air. Why couldn't my dad, who-ever he was, make a phone appear? **

**Thursday afternoon, three days after I'd arrived at Camp Half-Blood, I had my first sword-fighting lesson. Everybody from cabin eleven gathered in the big circular arena, where Luke would be our instructor.**

**We started with basic stabbing and slashing, using some straw-stuffed dummies in Greek armor. I guess I did okay. At least, I understood what I was supposed to do and my reflexes were good.**

"Now your reflexes need to increase from good to EXTREMLY dangerous," Cayden said. "Then no one can beat you."

"So you are still working on that?" Dylan asked innocently.

"Unlike you, who is only at 'At least I can hold a sword', I might add," Cayden retorted.

"I killed more dummies then you."

"At least I-"

"Okay, stop this nonsense so we can continue the book!" I yelled at them.

**The problem was, I couldn't find a blade that felt right in my hands. Either they were too heavy, or too light, or too long.**

_I swear Riptide is the _only _blade you can use._

**Luke tried his best to fix me up, but he agreed that none of the practice blades seemed to work for me.**

We moved on to dueling in pairs. Luke announced he would be my partner, since this was my first time.

**"Good luck," one of the campers told me. "Luke's the best swordsman in the last three hundred years."**

**"Maybe he'll go easy on me," I said. **

"Not if he suspected you were the demigod he was told about," I whispered to myself. Luckily Jaycee didn't hear me.

"Most never do and it doesn't help if they are your siblings." Dylan gave a pointed look at Ray.

"Sibling love Dill Pickle," Ray told him while hugging himself.

"I told you to never call me that again," Dylan hissed at his brother, who smiled deviously.

**The camper snorted.**

**Luke showed me thrusts and parries and shield blocks the hard way. With every swipe, I got a little more battered and bruised. "Keep your guard up, Percy," he'd say, then whap me in the ribs with the flat of his blade.**

"Now I wouldn't do it that extreme," Cayden pointed out.

"Liar! Just two weeks ago your half-brother came to the infirmary with a bruised arm," Talia told him.

"He needed to learn that he can't take my football cards."

"Not a good excuse bro," Nathan told him.

**"No, not that far up!" **_**Whap!**_** "Lunge!" **_**Whap!**_** "Now, back!" **_**Whap!**_** By the time he called a break, I was soaked in sweat. Everybody swarmed the drinks cooler. Luke poured ice water on his head, which looked like such a good idea, I did the same.**

I mentally grinned. Now Percy should be able to do some damage.

**Instantly, I felt better. Strength surged back into my arms. The sword didn't feel so awkward.**

Ella looked at me with a small smile. I think she may have figured it out. At first I also thought Shay figured it out, but from him muttering "Water…strength…dye 61…one green scale from a hippocampus…" I figured he was trying to figure out a potion to make.

**"Okay, everybody circle up!" Luke ordered. "If Percy doesn't mind, I want to give you a little demo."**

**Great, I thought. Let's all watch Percy get pounded.**

**The Hermes guys gathered around. They were suppressing smiles. I figured they'd been in my shoes before and couldn't wait to see how Luke used me for a punching bag. He told everybody he was going to demonstrate a disarming technique: how to twist the enemy's blade with the flat of your own sword so that he had no choice but to drop his weapon.**

**"This is difficult," he stressed.**

"That is difficult. It took about maybe two years to learn how to do it," Shay bragged.

"You still can't do it," Jaycee told him.

"And if I can't do it, you can't either," Nathan added.

**"I've had it used against me. No laughing at Percy, now. **

"To most people, that just tells you to laugh at him," Talia said.

"Considering how long it takes to learn that maneuver it would be very rude to laugh," Ella added.

"Even if they were once in his shoes," Nathan pointed out. "I bet they wouldn't like if anybody laughed at them."

**Most swordsmen have to work years to master this technique."**

**He demonstrated the move on me in slow motion. Sure enough, the sword clattered out of my hand.**

**"Now in real time," he said, after I'd retrieved my weapon. "We keep sparring until one of us pulls it off. Ready, Percy?"**

**I nodded, and Luke came after me. Somehow, I kept him from getting a shot at the hilt of my sword.**

"The magic word is _somehow_," Dylan chuckled.

Cayden looked impressed. "For a newbie it is impressive to block the hit aimed at your sword's hilt."

**My senses opened up. I saw his attacks coming. I countered. I stepped forward and tried a thrust of my own. Luke deflected it easily, but I saw a change in his face. His eyes narrowed, and he started to press me with more force.**

**The sword grew heavy in my hand. The balance wasn't right. I knew it was only a matter of seconds before Luke took me down, so I figured, What the heck? I tried the disarming maneuver. My blade hit the base of Luke's and I twisted, putting my whole weight into a downward thrust.**

**Clang.**

**Luke's sword rattled against the stones. The tip of my blade was an inch from his undefended chest.**

Many eyes lit up at that, especially Cayden's. He had a look of awe, admiration, and envy.

"I wish I learned that maneuver that fast," he grumbled.

"Calm down Cayden," Shay told the son of Ares. "It could have just been beginner's luck you know."

"If he could do that so fast, he must be a really good swordsman," Ray mentioned.

**The other campers were silent.**

**I lowered my sword. "Um, sorry."**

I shook my head at Percy. "Why would you say you are sorry Percy?"

"It's not like you can run through a monster and say sorry to the poor monster," Nathan grinned.

**For a moment, Luke was too stunned to speak.**

**"Sorry?" His scarred face broke into a grin. "By the gods, Percy, why are you sorry? Show me that again!"**

**I didn't want to. The short burst of manic energy had completely abandoned me. But Luke insisted.**

**This time, there was no contest. The moment our swords connected, Luke hit my hilt and sent my weapon skidding across the floor.**

"That energy must help him greatly," Jaycee thought out loud.

"You should make an energy potion!" Dylan said to Shay.

Shay grinned. "Already on it Dill Pickle."

"Not you too!"

**After a long pause, somebody in the audience said, "Beginner's luck?"**

"It would seem like," Talia admitted.

Luke wiped the sweat off his brow. He appraised at me with an entirely new interest.

**"Maybe," he said. "But I wonder what Percy could do with a balanced sword..."**

"I don't even want to imagine what can do and if he did have water strength at the time," Ella said.

_He would cause damage to the monster and the place._

**Friday afternoon, I was sitting with Grover at the lake, resting from a near-death experience on the climbing wall. Grover had scampered to the top like a mountain goat,**

"Not a surprise considering he is half goat." Ray sighed as he said this.

**but the lava had almost gotten me. My shirt had smoking holes in it. The hairs had been singed off my forearms.**

**We sat on the pier, watching the naiads do underwater basket-weaving, until I got up the nerve to ask Grover how his conversation had gone with Mr. D.**

"Horrid, rather curl up into a ball and whimper, was like picking strawberries for week nonstop," Shay named off.

"Please stop! We heard you rant about things like that before," Jaycee told him.

"But you went two weeks without hearing it."

**His face turned a sickly shade of yellow.**

**"Fine," he said. "Just great."**

**"So your career's still on track?"**

**He glanced at me nervously. "Chiron t-told you I want a searcher's license?" **

"Um, what's a searcher's license?" Dylan asked looking at me.

"A license to search," I told him.

"I figured that much out. I wanted to know what it is used for."

"For that you will have to wait for someone to give Percy an explanation on what it is."

**"Well... no." I had no idea what a searcher's license was, but it didn't seem like the right time to ask. **

"So much for that."

"I didn't say it would happen quickly," I smirked.

**"He just said you had big plans, you know ... and that you needed credit for completing a keeper's assignment. So did you get it?"**

**Grover looked down at the naiads. "Mr. D suspended judgment. He said I hadn't failed or succeeded with you yet, so our fates were still tied together. If you got a quest and I went along to protect you, and we both came back alive, then maybe he'd consider the job complete."**

**My spirits lifted. "Well, that's not so bad, right?"**

**"**_**Blaa-ha-ha!**_** He might as well have transferred me to stable-cleaning duty. The chances of you getting a quest... and even if you did, why would you want me along?"**

"If he is your best friend, he would bring you along in a heart beat," Talia said.

**"Of course I'd want you along!"**

**Grover stared glumly into the water. "Basket-weaving ... Must be nice to have a useful skill."**

"Yes, back in the days of the 1800s," Cayden snorted.

"Or used to just relax the mind," Ella told him.

Ray grumbled, "My mom makes me do it as a punishment sometimes."

"You do fail at," his girlfriend told him.

"And how would you know?"

"Your brother showed me and the rest of us, expect Thalia, a video of you trying to basket weave something bright pink."

"I will get you Dylan."

**I tried to reassure him that he had lots of talents, but that just made him look more miserable.**

**We talked about canoeing and swordplay for a while, then debated the pros and cons of the different gods. Finally, I asked him about the four empty cabins.**

"There are really only three empty cabins now- Artemis', Hera's, and Hades'," Jaycee pointed out. "The other cabins at least have one demigod living in the cabin."

_I guess Hades never had a kid in over a hundred years. _

**"Number eight, the silver one, belongs to Artemis," he said. "She vowed to be a maiden forever. So of course, no kids.**

Cayden snorted. "Maiden basically explains no kids."

"It does," I agreed, "but what a new demigod think if both Artemis and Athena are maidens but Athena has kids?"

"Probably that Athena wasn't a maiden anymore, or they would ask someone else why that is." He added the last part quickly when right outside the window, the sky started to darken.

**The cabin is, you know, honorary. If she didn't have one, she'd be mad."**

**"Yeah, okay. But the other three, the ones at the end. Are those the Big Three?"**

**Grover tensed. We were getting close to a touchy subject. "No. One of them, number two, is Hera's," he said. "That's another honorary thing. She's the goddess of marriage, so of course she wouldn't go around having affairs with mortals. That's her husband's job.**

I started laughing, as did the boys while the rest of the girls were chuckling.

"He says it so blunt like it is no big deal," Ella chuckled.

"I never knew satyrs could be so funny," Dylan said.

**When we say the Big Three, we mean the three powerful brothers, the sons of Kronos."**

**"Zeus, Poseidon, Hades."**

**"Right. You know. After the great battle with the Titans, they took over the world from their dad and drew lots to decide who got what."**

"Most days I think it may have been rigged," Nathan admitted.

Shay nodded in agreement. "Most likely it is to Hades."

**"Zeus got the sky," I remembered. "Poseidon the sea, Hades the Underworld." **

**"Uh-huh."**

**"But Hades doesn't have a cabin here."**

**"No. He doesn't have a throne on Olympus, either. He sort of does his own thing down in the Underworld. If he did have a cabin here ..." Grover shuddered. "Well, it wouldn't be pleasant. Let's leave it at that."**

"And they always wear dark colors," added Nathan. "It makes them seem paler then they really are. They seem emo, dark, and creepy most of the time."

"That is not really true," I said. "They may seem like it but deep down they can be really nice."

They all stared at me.

"What?" I questioned. _That was how it was with Nico_, but I didn't say that out loud.

"It is just that most people _would_ say they are creepy," Ray explained.

"But do you think that after you get to know them?" I asked them. They all shook their head no, well all expect Shay.

"They tell me to stay away from them since most of the time I would talk to them, it would be because I want a skeleton bone."

**"But Zeus and Poseidon—they both had, like, a bazillion kids in the myths. Why are their cabins empty?"**

**Grover shifted his hooves uncomfortably. "About sixty years ago, after World War II, the Big Three agreed they wouldn't sire any more heroes. Their children were just too powerful. They were affecting the course of human events too much, causing too much carnage. World War II, you know, that was basically a fight between the sons of Zeus and Poseidon on one side, and the sons of Hades on the other. The winning side, Zeus and Poseidon, made Hades swear an oath with them: no more affairs with mortal women. They all swore on the River Styx."**

**Thunder boomed.**

**I said, "That's the most serious oath you can make." **

"Percy actually is very observant," Jaycee said. "It seems like he can notice tiny little details that many may over look."

"Maybe he could be a detective," Dylan voiced.

Jaycee shook her head. "Since he has ADHD I doubt he would be able to be on a crime scene or in a house looking for clues for hours."

**Grover nodded.**

**"And the brothers kept their word—no kids?"**

**Grover's face darkened. "Seventeen years ago, Zeus fell off the wagon.**

"Sorry to Lord Zeus but he does seem like the first one of the Big Three to have a kid first," Ray said.

"I am not surprised either," I admitted. "When I went to school for a year, we talked about the Greek and Roman gods and the teacher's step-daughter basically called Zeus a womanizer."

"Was she blasted into ashes?" Cayden asked.

"No because the step-daughter was a child of Demeter and Zeus didn't want to be forced to eat cereal for the next thousand years."

**There was this TV starlet with a big fluffy eighties hairdo—he just couldn't help himself. When their child was born, a little girl named Thalia…**

"Wait," Ella said. "Your name is Thalia so-"

"So you are a daughter of Zeus," Shay interrupted, point a finger at me.

"Yes, Grover is talking about me. There is know need to get excited at him telling my back-story. You get to learn a few more things about me and the camp."

"What do you mean by 'learn about the camp'?" Talia questioned.

"Now, why would I tell you if you are going to find out?"

**well, the River Styx is serious about promises. Zeus himself got off easy because he's immortal, but he brought a terrible fate on his daughter."**

**"But that isn't fair! It wasn't the little girl's fault."**

"Why am I being described as a little girl?" I hissed. "I was twelve, not two."

**Grover hesitated. "Percy, children of the Big Three have powers greater than other half-bloods. They have a strong aura, a scent that attracts monsters. When Hades found out about the girl, he wasn't too happy about Zeus breaking his oath. Hades let the worst monsters out of Tartarus to torment Thalia. **

Most of them winced and sent me sorry looks. They probably couldn't imagine having a god send monsters after them because they weren't supposed to be born. Lucky them.

**A satyr was assigned to be her keeper when she was twelve, but there was nothing he could do. He tried to escort her here with a couple of other half-bloods she'd befriended. They almost made it. They got all the way to the top of that hill." **

**He pointed across the valley, to the pine tree where I'd fought the minotaur. "All three Kindly Ones were after them, along with a hoard of hellhounds. They were about to be overrun when Thalia told her satyr to take the other two half-bloods to safety while she held off the monsters.**

More looks. Mostly the looks were in worry at my blank face as I stared at the nearest wall, trying to avoid their looks.

"I couldn't imagine taking on all three Kindly Ones and a hoard of hellhounds," Jaycee whispered.

"And about to be over run too," Talia added. "I don't even know if I would tell the satyr to take them to safety or try to get there myself."

"And you don't know how old the other demigods were that Thalia befriended," Ray pointed out. "They could have been young or older, and if they experienced at fighting monsters, if they were to train themselves or was coming to camp early from a break."

They were trying to tempt me into telling them more. I could tell from the looks that they were giving me. They probably thought I didn't see them since I gave no reaction to them or what they were saying.

**She was wounded and tired, and she didn't want to live like a hunted animal. The satyr didn't want to leave her, but he couldn't change her mind, and he had to protect the others. So Thalia made her final stand alone, at the top of that hill. **

"Final stand almost sounds like death," Shay muttered.

Jaycee sent him a pointed look. "What was your first clue dummy?" she hissed at him.

**As she died, Zeus took pity on her. He turned her into that pine tree. Her spirit still helps protect the borders of the valley. That's why the hill is called Half-Blood Hill.**

"That is why the hill is called that," Ella realized. "Because that is where you died."

"So your dead body was in that tree," Dylan guessed. "But if that was the case, how are you alive?"

That was when I finally spoke. "My father turned me into the tree before I actually died. When I was the tree, I was still alive, but I was in what you could call a coma. I also aged, but not normally, really slow like how a tree would grow. As to how I am "alive", you will have to wait and read about it in the next book and maybe even the third."

**I stared at the pine in the distance.**

**The story made me feel hollow, and guilty too. A girl my age had sacrificed herself to save her friends. She had faced a whole army of monsters. Next to that, my victory over the Minotaur didn't seem like much.**

"I was turned into a pine tree so it wasn't a total victory," I said.

Cayden nodded his head. "And considering how Percy killed the Minotaur without any training and after seeing his mom disappear, I would say it is a good victory."

**I wondered, if I'd acted differently, could I have saved my mother? **

**"Grover," I said, "have heroes really gone on quests to the Underworld?"**

**"Sometimes," he said. "Orpheus. Hercules. Houdini."**

**"And have they ever returned somebody from the dead?"**

**"No. Never. Orpheus came close…. Percy, you're not seriously thinking—"**

**"No," I lied. "I was just wondering. So ... a satyr is always assigned to guard a demigod?"**

**Grover studied me warily. I hadn't persuaded him that I'd really dropped the Underworld idea.**

Ray shook his head. "Considering Percy's awful subject change, I can understand why Grover would look at him like that."

"I bet he and Chiron get along well then," Nathan smirked. "Chiron sometimes doesn't have good subject changes."

**"Not always. We go undercover to a lot of schools. We try to sniff out the half-bloods who have the makings of great heroes. If we find one with a very strong aura, like a child of the Big Three, we alert Chiron. He tries to keep an eye on them, since they could cause really huge problems."**

**"And you found me. Chiron said you thought I might be something special."**

_Grover, you are increasing his ego._

"Grover is digging his own grave," Talia said, rolling her eyes.

**Grover looked as if I'd just led him into a trap. "I didn't... Oh, listen, don't think like that. If you were—you know—you'd never ever be allowed a quest, and I'd never get my license. You're probably a child of Hermes. Or maybe even one of the minor gods, like Nemesis, the god of revenge. Don't worry, okay?"**

**I got the idea he was reassuring himself more than me.**

"Now that I don't get," Ella said. "Wouldn't he be happy if Percy was a child of the Big Three, wouldn't Grover be happy? He would have found _two _children of the Big Three. I would look at that as an accomplishment."

"You forgot the fact that the first child of the Big Three he found was turned into a tree," Shay told her, pointing at me.

"But he should over look that and at least feel proud that he found her."

"Even when he knows that the first child of the three brothers to be born in many years is now a pine tree? Yea, that is something to be proud of."

"It was not Grover's fault," I defended him but Shay didn't hear me.

"Well then he can tell the people that talk crap about it to shut up," Ella argued.

"And then risk-"

"Stop!" Nathan yelled. "You two are giving me a headache."

**That night after dinner, there was a lot more excitement than usual.**

**At last, it was time for capture the flag.**

"Finally!" Cayden cheered. "We get to hear about the greatest game ever and how Percy does."

**When the plates were cleared away, the conch horn sounded and we all stood at our tables.**

**Campers yelled and cheered as Annabeth and two of her siblings ran into the pavilion carrying a silk banner. It was about ten feet long, glistening gray, with a painting of a barn owl above an olive tree. From the opposite side of the pavilion, Clarisse and her buddies ran in with another banner, of identical size, but gaudy red, painted with a bloody spear and a boar's head.**

**I turned to Luke and yelled over the noise, "Those are the flags?"**

"Most new campers are surprised by the size of the flags," Dylan said. "I remember by one half-sibling tell me that when she played capture the flag with her friends, they used colored rags as the flags."

"But that was most likely a few mortals playing in someone's backyard," Jaycee pointed out.

"She did say that each side had a jail and the jail was standing on an area in the yard that had rocks. And that most of the time no one was watching so one of your other team mates could get you out."

"Just standing there is not a good jail," Cayden said.

**"Yeah."**

**"Ares and Athena always lead the teams?"**

**"Not always," he said. "But often."**

"Because one side makes the best plans to win and the other has good fighters," Ray said.

**"So, if another cabin captures one, what do you do— repaint the flag?"**

**He grinned. "You'll see.**

"Could you imagine painting the flags?" Nathan asked. "It would take forever and all the new paint could way it down."

"And that is why the flags change on their own," I told him.

**First we have to get one."**

**"Whose side are we on?"**

**He gave me a sly look, as if he knew something I didn't. The scar on his face made him look almost evil in the torchlight.**

I gave a heavy sigh. _Why did your fate have you become evil Luke?_

**"We've made a temporary alliance with Athena. Tonight, we get the flag from Ares. And you are going to help."**

**The teams were announced. Athena had made an alliance with Apollo and Hermes, the two biggest cabins. Apparently, privileges had been traded—shower times, chore schedules, the best slots for activities—in order to win support.**

**Ares had allied themselves with everybody else: Dionysus, Demeter, Aphrodite, and Hephaestus. From what I'd seen, Dionysus's kids were actually good athletes, but there were only two of them. Demeter's kids had the edge with nature skills and outdoor stuff but they weren't very aggressive.**

"It is true," Ray told his girlfriend after she gave a pout at that.

"I know that."

"But you guys are pretty scary when you get really mad," Dylan told her.

"If nobody would make us mad, you wouldn't have to deal with that."

**Aphrodite's sons and daughters I wasn't too worried about. They mostly sat out every activity and checked their reflections in the lake and did their hair and gossiped.**

"Not me most of the time," Nathan grumbled.

"A few of your siblings do participate," Talia reminded him.

"But then they go back to the cabin and fix their hair."

**Hephaestus's kids weren't pretty, and there were only four of them, but they were big and burly from working in the metal shop all day. They might be a problem.**

**"With all the traps they come up with, yeah, they will be a problem," I said.**

**That, of course, left Ares's cabin: a dozen of the biggest, ugliest, meanest kids on Long Island, or anywhere else on the planet. **

Cayden rolled his eyes at that.

**Chiron hammered his hoof on the marble.**

**"Heroes!" he announced. "You know the rules. The creek is the boundary line. The entire forest is fair game. All magic items are allowed. The banner must be prominently displayed, and have no more than two guards. Prisoners may be disarmed, but may not be bound or gagged. No killing or maiming is allowed. I will serve as referee and battlefield medic. Arm yourselves!"**

**He spread his hands, and the tables were suddenly covered with equipment: helmets, bronze swords, spears, oxhide shields coated in metal.**

**"Whoa," I said. "We're really supposed to use these?"**

"Considering it is his first time at camp, it is fair that he would be surprised by seeing the weapons," Ella said looking at Shay and Dylan shaking their heads at Percy.

"And if I remember correctly, you were surprised at the fact we were going to be using weapons," Talia added, looking at Shay.

Shay started to frown. "The only weapons I ever used in a capture the flag game was paintballs."

**Luke looked at me as if I were crazy. "Unless you want to get skewered by your friends in cabin five. Here—Chiron thought these would fit. You'll be on border patrol."**

**My shield was the size of an NBA backboard, with a big caduceus in the middle. It weighed about a million pounds. I could have snowboarded on it fine,**

I shuddered at the memory. I am never doing that again.

"Now that I think of it, that sounds like fun," Ray said.

I shook my head. "It really isn't Ray."

"Had a first hand experience at that didn't you?"

"Yes but that is a story the will never hear."

**but I hoped nobody seriously expected me to run fast. My helmet, like all the helmets on Athena's side, had a blue horsehair plume on top. Ares and their allies had red plumes.**

**Annabeth yelled, "Blue team, forward!"**

**We cheered and shook our swords and followed her down the path to the south woods. The red team yelled taunts at us as they headed off toward the north.**

**I managed to catch up with Annabeth without tripping over my equipment. "Hey."**

**She kept marching.**

"Someone is getting the cold shoulder," Nathan sang, really badly I might add.

"Are you sure you don't want singing lessons?" Talia asked.

Shay told him, "It could work wonders with your lack of voice."

"Then we can take them together Shay since your worse then me."

"Hurtful man, hurtful."

**"So what's the plan?" I asked. "Got any magic items you can loan me?"**

**Her hand drifted toward her pocket, as if she were afraid I'd stolen something.**

**"Just watch Clarisse's spear," she said. "You don't want that thing touching you. **

"I wonder why," Jaycee thought out loud.

**Otherwise, don't worry. We'll take the banner from Ares. Has Luke given you your job?"**

**"Border patrol, whatever that means."**

**"It's easy. Stand by the creek, keep the reds away. Leave the rest to me. Athena always has a plan."**

"Who here thinks that is her catch phrase?" Cayden questioned everyone. They all raised their hands, including myself. Annabeth did say that a lot.

**She pushed ahead, leaving me in the dust.**

I started to hum _Another One Bits the Dust_. I don't really like the song but the title I thought went along with what Percy said. The others just looked at me weird.

"Okay," I mumbled. "Glad you wanted me on your team."

**It was a warm, sticky night. The woods were dark, with fireflies popping in and out of view.**

**Annabeth stationed me next to a little creek that gurgled over some rocks, then she and the rest of the team scattered into the trees.**

**Standing there alone, with my big blue-feathered helmet and my huge shield, I felt like an idiot. The bronze sword, like all the swords I'd tried so far, seemed balanced wrong. The leather grip pulled on my hand like a bowling ball.**

"I am sorry but he is so picky with finding a sword," Cayden said. "He better find one soon or he will get killed."

"Maybe the Hephaestus cabin will make him a custom sword," Ella suggested.

"Maybe but I still don't get how he can't find a sword. For most campers it is either the length or the weight but not everything. It seems that he needs one specific sword."

"And you just spoke the truth," I whispered so he wouldn't here me.

**There was no way anybody would actually attack me, would they? I mean, Olympus had to have liability issues, right?**

**Far away, the conch horn blew. I heard whoops and yells in the woods, the clanking of metal, kids fighting. A blue-plumed ally from Apollo raced past me like a deer, leaped through the creek, and disappeared into enemy territory.**

**Great, I thought. I'll miss all the fun, as usual.**

**Then I heard a sound that sent a chill up my spine, a low canine growl, somewhere close by.**

"It couldn't be a monster in the woods, right?" Dylan asked.

Talia shook her head. "Most go away when we play."

"So one monster didn't get the memo," Shay concluded.

_Or someone summoned it. _

**I raised my shield instinctively; I had the feeling something was stalking me.**

**Then the growling stopped. I felt the presence retreating.**

**On the other side of the creek, the underbrush exploded. Five Ares warriors came yelling and screaming out of the dark.**

**"Cream the punk!" Clarisse screamed.**

**Her ugly pig eyes glared through the slits of her helmet.**

Dylan, Ray, and Shay started to laugh so hard that they had tears running down their face.

"Percy won't have a fair fight if he is verses five of the Ares," Jaycee said over the laughter.

"All fair in love and war," Nathan yelled.

"What love Nathan?" Ella questioned.

"Percy and Annabeth of course."

"They aren't really friends yet."

"Yes but they will be together. I don't know why but I have a good feeling that they will."

**She brandished a five-foot-long spear, its barbed metal tip flickering with red light. Her siblings had only the standard-issue bronze swords—not that that made me feel any better.**

**They charged across the stream. There was no help in sight. I could run. Or I could defend myself against half the Ares cabin.**

**I managed to sidestep the first kid's swing, but these guys were not as stupid the Minotaur. They surrounded me, and Clarisse thrust at me with her spear. My shield deflected the point, but I felt a painful tingling all over my body. My hair stood on end. My shield arm went numb, and the air burned.**

**Electricity. Her stupid spear was electric.**

"Electric spears do work well against monsters," Cayden said.

"I wouldn't want to be hit with one though, neither would you," Shay told him.

"It would be cool to have one though."

**I fell back.**

**Another Ares guy slammed me in the chest with the butt of his sword and I hit the dirt.**

**They could've kicked me into jelly, but they were too busy laughing.**

"They should go a little easier on him," Ella grumbled. "It is his first time playing too _and_ he can't find the right sword that feels good to him."

"It happens in every game though," Talia pointed out. "Then the campers would defend themselves by saying that they were training the new camper for the real world of fighting monsters."

"I know that but I still think that it shouts unfair."

**"Give him a haircut," Clarisse said. "Grab his hair."**

**I managed to get to my feet. I raised my sword, but Clarisse slammed it aside with her spear as sparks flew. Now both my arms felt numb.**

**"Oh, wow," Clarisse said. "I'm scared of this guy. Really scared."**

**"The flag is that way," I told her.**

"Even though he is being attack, you don't give away the location of the flag," Nathan said. "Unless you were sending them in the wrong direction, that might be the only exception."

**I wanted to sound angry, but I was afraid it didn't come out that way.**

**"Yeah," one of her siblings said. "But see, we don't care about the flag. We care about a guy who made our cabin look stupid."**

"So having five against one sword fight in a game where your goal is to get the other teams flag is the best solution," I said sarcastically.

"Not the smartest revenge plan at all," Ray muttered.

**"You do that without my help," I told them. It probably wasn't the smartest thing to say.**

**Two of them came at me. I backed up toward the creek, tried to raise my shield, but Clarisse was too fast. Her spear stuck me straight in the ribs. If I hadn't been wearing an armored breastplate, I would've been shish-ke-babbed.**

"Thank goodness for armor," I shouted.

"If he wasn't wearing armor, it would have been bad," Shay stated. "You could have an angry god on your hands."

**As it was, the electric point just about shocked my teeth out of my mouth. One of her cabinmates slashed his sword across my arm, leaving a good-size cut.**

**Seeing my own blood made me dizzy—warm and cold at the same time.**

**"No maiming," I managed to say.**

**"Oops," the guy said. "Guess I lost my dessert privilege.**

"How is that a punishment?" Dylan yelled. "He could be lying on the ground dead and all the person gets is no dessert."

"They must have changed the rules over the year," Jaycee guessed. "If that happened today, you would have kitchen patrol and cleaning the stables out for three months."

**He pushed me into the creek and I landed with a splash. They all laughed. I figured as soon as they were through being amused, I would die. But then something happened. The water seemed to wake up my senses, as if I'd just had a bag of my mom's double-espresso jelly beans.**

"Tonight I am going to try and make that potion," Shay said to Dylan. "We might need it for battles."

"Lets hope nothing drastic happens," Nathan said, looking at Shay. "I did not like having yellow eyes for a month."

**Clarisse and her cabinmates came into the creek to get me, but I stood to meet them. I knew what to do. I swung the flat of my sword against the first guy's head and knocked his helmet clean off. I hit him so hard I could see his eyes vibrating as he crumpled into the water.**

**Ugly Number Two and Ugly Number Three came at me.**

All the boys expect for Cayden, started to laugh.

"He gave them nicknames in battle," I said.

"I would be more likely thinking of how to defeat the enemy, not giving away nicknames," Ray admitted.

**I slammed one in the face with my shield and used my sword to shear off the other guy's horsehair plume. Both of them backed up quick. Ugly Number Four didn't look really anxious to attack, but Clarisse kept coming, the point of her spear crackling with energy. As soon as she thrust, I caught the shaft between the edge of my shield and my sword, and I snapped it like a twig.**

**"Ah!" she screamed. "You idiot! You corpse-breath worm!"**

_That would be Nico. _

"I bet he was happy about that," I said aloud.

**She probably would've said worse, but I smacked her between the eyes with my sword-butt and sent her stumbling backward out of the creek.**

Dylan and Ray started to cheer at that.

"Revenge," Shay said, grinning like a madman.

"Karma's a bitch," Talia sang.

Nathan looked at them strangely. "You guys give me the creeps."

**Then I heard yelling, elated screams, and I saw Luke racing toward the boundary line with the red team's banner lifted high. He was flanked by a couple of Hermes guys covering his retreat, and a few Apollos behind them, fighting off the Hephaestus kids. The Ares folks got up, and Clarisse muttered a dazed curse.**

**"A trick!" she shouted. "It was a trick."**

"If they weren't so worried about attacking Percy, they might have won," Ella said, looking towards Cayden as if questioning him to disagree.

"I know that look Ella and you know I agree with you."

"I am surprised that you actually agreed with me."

"I seen that look before," Cayden told her. "And that was before Ray 'accidently' broke his wrist in a sword fight last year."

**They staggered after Luke, but it was too late. Everybody converged on the creek as Luke ran across into friendly territory. Our side exploded into cheers. The red banner shimmered and turned to silver. The boar and spear were replaced with a huge caduceus, the symbol of cabin eleven. Everybody on the blue team picked up Luke and started carrying him around on their shoulders. Chiron cantered out from the woods and blew the conch horn.**

**The game was over. We'd won.**

**I was about to join the celebration when Annabeth's voice, right next to me in the creek, said, "Not bad, hero."**

**I looked, but she wasn't there.**

"Does she have super powers?" Dylan questioned me.

"Annabeth-"

"She was probably in a tree," Shay interrupted me.

Jaycee shook her head no. "He said that he heard Annabeth's voice right next to him."

"Maybe he is going crazy!" Ray put in.

**"Where the heck did you learn to fight like that?" she asked. The air shimmered, and she materialized, holding a Yankees baseball cap as if she'd just taken it off her head.**

Nathan looked puzzled. "Why would she be holding a Yankees baseball cap?"

"It also you to become invisible," I informed him.

**I felt myself getting angry. I wasn't even fazed by the fact that she'd just been invisible. "You set me up," I said. "You put me here because you knew Clarisse would come after me, while you sent Luke around the flank. You had it all figured out."**

**Annabeth shrugged. "I told you. Athena always, always has a plan."**

**"A plan to get me pulverized."**

**"I came as fast as I could. I was about to jump in, but ..." She shrugged. "You didn't need help."**

"Was she blind? Percy could have bled to death," Ella yelled.

"Annabeth probably didn't come to the area where they were fighting right away," Ray reasoned with her. "All she probably saw was Percy defeating the Ares campers."

"That would explain why she didn't jump into the fight," Jaycee added.

**Then she noticed my wounded arm. "How did you do that?"**

**"Sword cut," I said. "What do you think?"**

"Smart ass," I muttered.

**"No. It was a sword cut. Look at it."**

**The blood was gone. Where the huge cut had been, there was a long white scratch, and even that was fading. As I watched, it turned into a small scar, and disappeared.**

The others looked amazed at that. Ella looked like that was the last piece of information she needed to confirm her suspicion.

"That is so cool!" Shay yelled.

Jaycee seemed to be thinking at what she heard. "I can only think of one cabin with that power."

**"I—I don't get it," I said.**

**Annabeth was thinking hard. I could almost see the gears turning. She looked down at my feet, then at Clarisse's broken spear, and said, "Step out of the water, Percy."**

**"What—"**

**"Just do it."**

**I came out of the creek and immediately felt bone tired. My arms started to go numb again. My adrenaline rush left me. I almost fell over, but Annabeth steadied me.**

**"Oh, Styx," she cursed. "This is not good. I didn't want ... I assumed it would be Zeus…"**

I may have looked calm on the outside but on the inside, I was horrified at the idea if Percy was my brother. No, just no. We may be similar but would be better off as friends not half brother and sister.

"It would make sense that she would assume that it would be Zeus," Cayden said. "He was the first one to break the pack that they made so most would think it was him."

"He is powerful but there are other powerful gods," Talia said. "His parent is most likely not Zeus but maybe someone else based on what we read."

Great, Talia figured Percy is Poseidon's son.

**Before I could ask what she meant, I heard that canine growl again, but much closer than before. A howl ripped through the forest.**

"That almost sounds like a hellhound," Shay said. "What other monster usually growls or howls?"

"Maybe a werewolf," Ray suggested.

"I don't think there was a full moon at the time."

"Maybe it could have been a special breed."

"Why would there-"

"Are you really going to argue about this right now?" Jaycee asked them. "Your argument is really pointless and stupid."

**The campers' cheering died instantly. Chiron shouted something in Ancient Greek, which I would realize, only later, I had understood perfectly: **_**"Stand ready! My bow!"  
><strong>_**  
>Annabeth drew her sword.<strong>

**There on the rocks just above us was a black hound the size of a rhino, with lava-red eyes and fangs like daggers.**

**It was looking straight at me.**

"It is a hellhound," Nathan muttered.

"If it is looking at Percy then it must have been sent to attack him," Talia said, ending in a whisper.

**Nobody moved except Annabeth, who yelled, "Percy, run!"**

**She tried to step in front of me, but the hound was too fast. It leaped over her—an enormous shadow with teeth—and just as it hit me, as I stumbled backward and felt its razor-sharp claws ripping through my armor, there was a cascade of thwacking sounds, like forty pieces of paper being ripped one after the other. From the hounds neck sprouted a cluster of arrows. The monster fell dead at my feet.**

"That was close," I whispered. I knew about the hellhound attack but was never given the details, besides that Luke did summon it.

"Who would want him to be dead that bad?" Nathan asked. "He hasn't been at camp for that long and he already has someone hating his guts."

**By some miracle, I was still alive. I didn't want to look underneath the ruins of my shredded armor. My chest felt warm and wet, and I knew I was badly cut. Another second, and the monster would've turned me into a hundred pounds of delicatessen meat.**

_Did he really have to think the last part? He is going to give somebody a heart attack one day with his not-so positive thoughts. _

**Chiron trotted up next to us, a bow in his hand, his face grim.**

_**"Di immortales!"**_**Annabeth said. "That's a hellhound from the Fields of Punishment. They don't ... they're not supposed to ..."**

**"Someone summoned it," Chiron said. "Someone inside the camp."**

"Like I said, who wants him dead that bad?" Nathan repeated.

"How are we supposed to know Nathan?" Ray asked him. "We can never understand the minds of the campers from back then."

"I am just putting my thoughts out there."

**Luke came over, the banner in his hand forgotten, his moment of glory gone.**

**Clarisse yelled, "It's all Percy's fault! Percy summoned it!"**

Ella rolled her eyes. "Yes, Percy summoned a hellhound, that he probably doesn't know about to I might add, and have it kill himself. Percy _must_ be the most logical suspect."

**"Be quiet, child," Chiron told her.**

**We watched the body of the hellhound melt into shadow, soaking into the ground until it disappeared.**

**"You're wounded," Annabeth told me. "Quick, Percy, get in the water."**

**"I'm okay."**

_Get into the water Percy unless you want to be dead._

**"No, you're not," she said. "Chiron, watch this."**

**I was too tired to argue. I stepped back into the creek, the whole camp gathering around me.**

"They were probably wondering why Annabeth told him to get into the water," Cayden said. "He would have gone to Chiron to be healed or to an Apollo camper, not into the water."

"It must have been a strange sight," Ray said.

**Instantly, I felt better. I could feel the cuts on my chest closing up. Some of the campers gasped.**

**"Look, I—I don't know why," I said, trying to apologize. "I'm sorry..."**

**But they weren't watching my wounds heal. They were staring at something above my head.**

"He is being claimed!" Talia shouted.

"No, I thought he was ordering a pizza," Ray said sarcastically.

"I was not asking for your two sense."

**"Percy," Annabeth said, pointing. "Um ..."**

**By the time I looked up, the sign was already fading, but I could still make out the hologram of green light, spinning and gleaming. A three-tipped spear: a trident.**

"His father is Poseidon," Shay shouted.

**"Your father," Annabeth murmured. "This is really not good."**

**"It is determined," Chiron announced.**

**All around me, campers started kneeling, even the Ares cabin, though they didn't look happy about it.**

**"My father?" I asked, completely bewildered.**

"Yes, that is what Annabeth just said," I muttered.

**"Poseidon," said Chiron. "Earthshaker, Stormbringer, Father of Horses. Hail, Perseus Jackson, Son of the Sea God."**

"End of chapter," Ella said, closing the book. "Now we know who Percy's parent is."

"But if he has powers over water, how could he die in a fire?" Cayden asked looking at me.

"Is there more to the story then you are telling us?" Talia added.

"Fine, I will tell the rest of the story without reveling too much," I told them. "An enemy of Annabeth and Percy wanted revenge on them. When they went to dinner with their friends, someone happened to put a potion in their food that would put the person who takes it will be in an endless sleep for twenty-four hours. The potion would start to work when they actually feel asleep. The person who wanted revenge then had an _empusa _and hellhound set the house on fire. Since they were asleep, Percy couldn't wake up and put the fire out. Poseidon or Athena couldn't save them because of the law that they can't interfere with their children's fate. Is it that the dinner signals? Well, we better hurry if we don't want to be late."

I quickly left the Apollo cabin before anyone could say a word to me. They will have to wait till dinner is over to read the rest of the next chapter.

* * *

><p><strong>Out of 17 votes, 15 of you said yes to having the ghosts of Percy and his friends come and read the books. I will have a new poll up because two people suggested two different ideas. One is two make them solid and the other is to have them be reborn and then come to camp. I will put up the new poll and you guys can decide. I really hope I can update in a week or two but I can't promise it since I am leaving for marching band camp in less then two weeks. Hopefully I cleared up most of the confusion on how Percy and Annabeth died. The person may be revealed soon. Hopefully where you leave it isn't raining.<strong>

**~sciencelover**


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